Published on: 6 August 2023 at 22:44 IST
Court: Supreme Court
Citation: NHAI V. M. Hakeem (2021)
Honourable Supreme Court of India has held that the Hon’ble Court in exercise Section 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 can only set aside the award and have no powers to modify an award.
31. Thus, there can be no doubt that given the law laid down by this Court, Section 34 of the Arbitration Act, 1996 cannot be held to include within it a power to modify an award. The sheet anchor of the argument of the respondents is the judgment of the learned Single Judge in Gayatri Balaswamy. This matter arose out of a claim for damages by an employee on account of sexual harassment at the workplace.
The learned Single Judge referred to the power to modify or correct an award under Section 15 of the Arbitration Act, 1940 in para 29 of the judgment. Thereafter, a number of judgments of this Court were referred to in which awards were modified by this Court, presumably under the powers of this Court under Article 142 of the Constitution of India. In para 34, the learned Single Judge referred to para 52 in McDermott case and then concluded that since the observations made in the said para were not given in answer to a pointed question as to whether the court had the power under Section 34 to modify or vary an award, this judgment cannot be said to have settled the answer to the question raised finally.
Drafted By Abhijit Mishra