Techfab approached the High Court stating that it is party to an agency agreement with Midima under which disputes have arisen and Article 9 of the agreement contains the arbitration agreement and dispute resolution mechanism.
The Court was told that as per Article 9, the parties agreed to multi-tier clause according to which, after failure of the pre-arbitral steps, the parties agreed to refer their disputes to arbitration.
Midima issued notice of arbitration in September 2019 and sought to invoke arbitration in terms of Article 9.1 of the Agency Agreement.
However, it took no further action under this notice for a very period of time.
Eventually, it filed an application before the Secretary General of the PCA at the Hague in Netherlands on March 19, 2020 to designate an appointing authority under Article 6.2 of the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules (2010).
Later, on December 23, 2023, Techfab was informed that an arbitral tribunal has been constituted and that a case management conference would be held virtually on January 10, 2023.
Techfab did not attend the case management hearing on that date after which the arbitrator directed them to be represented at a re-convened case management hearing on January 22, 2024, failing which they would be proceeded ex-parte.
Techfab argued before the High Court that the proceedings before the sole arbitrator are non-est since they have not been initiated in accordance with and are not founded on the arbitration clause contained in the agency agreement between the parties.
Source: Barandbench
