Singapore court docket junks ‘copy-paste’ arbitration award handed down by ex-CJI Misra

The tribunal’s “copy-paste” strategy, the court docket held, violated core ideas of pure justice and raised critical issues about bias, equity and the integrity of the arbitral course of. The Court docket of Attraction, led by chief justice Sundaresh Menon and justice Steven Chong, famous in its judgment on April 8 that the award “was ready utilizing the Parallel Awards as templates to a really substantial diploma” with out regard to materials variations in arguments, contracts or context.

The dispute stemmed from a contract between a special-purpose car managing freight corridors in India and a consortium of three infrastructure corporations. At challenge was whether or not a 2017 Indian authorities notification on revised minimal wages entitled the consortium to increased funds. When negotiations failed, the matter went to arbitration in Singapore underneath the Worldwide Chamber of Commerce (ICC) Guidelines.

The arbitral tribunal, comprising justice Misra as presiding arbitrator and two co-arbitrators, justices Krishn Kumar Lahoti and Gita Mittal, dominated in favour of the consortium in November 2023. Nonetheless, the award was quickly challenged earlier than the Singapore Worldwide Industrial Court docket, which discovered that enormous components of the ruling have been lifted wholesale from two prior arbitration awards authored by justice Misra in comparable disputes involving totally different events. That discovering has now been affirmed by the Court docket of Attraction.

Justice Misra didn’t reply to requests for remark.

The Court docket of Attraction’s ruling recognized three key grounds the place pure justice was compromised. The Court docket discovered that utilizing earlier awards as templates with out modification led to a powerful look of prejudgment. A good-minded observer, the judges mentioned, would “moderately suspect that the tribunal had approached the arbitration with a closed thoughts.”

The court docket flagged cognitive biases equivalent to “anchoring bias”, the place early conclusions in a single case unduly affect selections in one other, and “affirmation bias”—favouring outcomes aligned with previous beliefs. Given that almost half the textual content was copied with out tailoring it to the info of this case, the Court docket concluded the tribunal possible failed to think about the matter afresh.

“We’re amply glad {that a} fair-minded observer… would have concluded that the integrity of the decision-making course of had been compromised,” the Court docket dominated.

Second, the Court docket underlined undisclosed reliance on extraneous materials. The tribunal drew closely from prior arbitrations that the events to the current dispute had no entry to. By lifting and counting on arguments and factual assumptions from different proceedings, the tribunal disadvantaged the events of their proper to be heard.

“The patently substantial materials derived from the Parallel Arbitrations have been extraneous issues that had not been raised to the events’ consideration… The Award couldn’t be ready by such a course of,” held the Court docket, discovering a transparent breach of the truthful listening to rule.

The choice additionally pointed up inequality amongst arbitrators. Whereas justice Misra had presided over the earlier instances, the 2 co-arbitrators, justices Lahoti and Mittal, had not. The Court docket famous that they have been positioned in an “unequal place,” unaware of the origins and context of almost half the ultimate award, but anticipated to co-sign it.

“The expectation of equality as between the arbitrators was compromised… They might thus have had no direct entry to any materials or information derived from these proceedings, however which appeared to have considerably influenced the end result.” This imbalance, the Court docket discovered, additional undermined the integrity of the award and the credibility of the arbitral course of.

Whereas the Court docket kept away from making any findings of unhealthy religion or misconduct on the a part of justice Misra or the tribunal, it underscored that the procedural shortcuts taken had rendered the award unsustainable.