Board of Major Port Authority for Shyama Prasad Mookerjee Port Vs Marine Craft Engineers Private Limited (Calcutta High Court)
Facts – The petitioner filed an application for stay of an arbitral award passed by the West Bengal State Micro Small Enterprises Facilitation Council. The impugned award was passed by the Council under section 18(3) of The Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Act, 2006 (MSMED Act).
The petitioner contended that the court can consider the application for stay of the award since the requirement under section 36(2) of the 1996 Act is only to “file” an application under section 34 for setting aside of the award whereas section 19 of the MSMED Act debars the Court from ‘entertaining’ the section 34 application until the buyer/the applicant has made the pre-deposit of 75%. Further, since the two proceedings are entirely different, the present application for stay of the award can be maintained on the filing of a section 34 application without the pre-deposit required under section 19 of the MSMED Act.
On the other hand, the respondent contented that the present application for stay of the award is not maintainable since the petitioner has not made the pre-deposit of 75% of the awarded amount as required under section 19 of the MSMED Act for setting aside of the award.
Conclusion-
The correct sequence under the Acts would therefore be:-
