Assam Import Agency vs Cement Corp. of India Ltd.

Shiv Narayan Dhingra, J.—By this order, I shall dispose of the objections filed by the plaintiff/petitioner u/s 30, 34 of the Arbitration Act, 1940 against an award dated 31st December 1991 whereby the claim of plaintiff was rejected and a NIL award was passed.

Brief facts relevant for the purpose of deciding this suit are that the plaintiff entered into a contract with defendant for handling of the cement. The relevant clauses of contract are as under:

Clause (i). That you are awarded the work of handling cement at Jogighopa Dump at Rs. 17 PMT as per terms and conditions of our Tender as further modified and agreed to during discussions on 07.10.1983.

Clause (iv). In case the cement is supplied to the Consignee directly from the wagons you will be paid the rate of Rs. 8/50 PMT.

Clause (v). The loading charges from the railway wagons or from your godowns to the Consignee/lorry will be reinstated at the rate per MT approved by the State/ Central Govt. authorities.

In the contract, the quantity stipulated was 47,000 MT, however, this quantity was variable. The contract was granted for one year. The contention of plaintiff is that the actual quantity forwarded by defendant and handled by plaintiff was much less. The plaintiff had made arrangement for stipulated quantity and incurred expenditure for handling large quantity of 47,000 MT whereas the quantity forwarded was 16650/- MT. The plaintiff raised a bill of Rs. 2,99,004/- on the basis of expenditure incurred by it for the contracted quantity. The defendant took a stand that this bill was not payable as the plaintiff had been paid handling charges in accordance with the contract. Ultimately, the dispute was referred, at the instance of the plaintiff, to the arbitrator. Before the arbitrator, the plaintiff raised a claim of Rs. 8,12,715/-towards loss because of expenditure incurred by plaintiff on godown etc and raised a claim of Rs. 3,18,692/- on the ground that he was not paid full amount for the quantity of cement handled. The petitioner/plaintiff also claimed a sum of Rs. 8,50,000/- under clause 4 on the ground that the plaintiff was also entitled to payment @Rs. 8.50 PMT for quantity supplied directly by defendant/respondent to the consignees by wagons. The plaintiff also claimed interest over this amount. The learned arbitrator found the claim made by the plaintiff as untenable. It is also observed by learned arbitrator that during continuation of arbitral proceedings parties had settled their accounts in respect of other things and in view of settlement arrived at, he was only to give an award in respect of unresolved disputes regarding.

The plaintiff had argued before the arbitrator that it was entitled to claim handling charges even for that cement which directly went to the consignee without having been handled by the plaintiff @Rs. 8.50 PMT. The learned arbitrator after considering clauses (i), (iv) and (v) came to conclusion that there was two kinds of handling to be done by plaintiff; one where the cement was to arrive at the railway station and was to be taken by the plaintiff to his godwon and then supplied to the consignees. In such a case, the plaintiff was entitled for handling charges @ Rs.17 PMT and the second type of handling was one where the cement arrived at the railway station from wagons and it was not to be taken to the godown but from wagon itself it was loaded to the trucks of the consignees directly. For such a handling, the plaintiff was entitled for Rs. 8.50 PMT. The learned arbitrator turned down the plea of petitioner that the petitioner was also entitled to handling charges in respect of those consignments which were not handled by the petitioner in anyone of the above two manners and the consignment went directly to the consignee through wagons itself.

I consider that the contract between petitioner and respondent could not have been interpreted in any other manner. The petitioner was given contract of handling the cement and if cement was not to be handled by the petitioner in any manner, the petitioner was not entitled for any handling charges.

The learned Counsel for petitioner argued that no amount was paid in respect of the settlement and the arbitrator should have mentioned the amount to be paid to petitioner under the settlement. Counsel for respondent submitted that the amount as agreed during settlement was paid to the petitioner after the settlement was arrived at and the learned arbitrator was only to give an award in respect of unresolved dispute regarding applicability of clause iv on consignment of cement which directly went to the consignee and no handling was done by the petitioner.

I have perused the record and the reply filed by respondent. The respondent had given details of the handling charges payment made by respondent to the petitioner under the contract. Thus, the plea of plaintiff that it was not paid the amount on account of handling charges is baseless. I also find that the award passed by learned arbitrator suffers from no infirmity and the learned arbitrator did not misconduct himself nor the award suffers from an error on the face of it. The allegations made by the plaintiff against the arbitrator that the award was ante-dated is also baseless . I find no force in the petition. The petition is hereby dismissed. No orders as to costs.