As many as six years after the law was amended, the Union Government is yet to constitute the Arbitration Council of India to regulate and promote institutional arbitration in the country.
Senior officials in the Union Law Ministry said it took years for corporates and public sector undertakings to shun ad-hoc arbitration and go far institutional arbitration to settle commercial disputes.
The proposed council is mandated to regulate institutional arbitration. “But when institutional arbitration has not taken shape in India, who would the Arbitration Council regulate? Now it has taken shape, and within this year, the proposed council will be set up,” an official said.
However, a former Union Law Secretary had a contrary view.
“The provision for an institutional mechanism by the Arbitration Council of India was made by amending the Arbitration Act way back in 2019. It has been more than six years now and the proposed council has not yet been constituted. It is adversely affecting making India as a hub of international arbitration,” former Union Law Secretary P.K. Malhotra told PTI.
