Section 9 interim relief after tribunal constitution is curtailed unless Section 17 is shown to be inefficacious.

After constitution of the arbitral tribunal, a court should ordinarily not entertain a pending Section 9 application for interim relief once Section 17 is available, because the post-amendment restriction is procedural and applies to pending court proceedings. The expression "entertain" was read as consideration on merits, so the bar operated even though the application had been filed earlier. Interim relief was therefore to be sought before the tribunal unless the applicant showed that the Section 17 remedy would be inefficacious. On the facts, no exceptional circumstance was shown, so the refusal of Section 9 relief was sustained, with only short status quo protection granted to allow recourse to Section 17.

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Issues: Whether, after constitution of the arbitral tribunal and commencement of arbitral proceedings, the Court could still entertain and grant interim relief under Section 9 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 in a pending application filed before the Arbitration and Conciliation (Amendment) Act, 2015 came into force.

Analysis: Section 26 of the Amendment Act was construed as applying to arbitral proceedings commenced under Section 21 of the 1996 Act and not to court proceedings pending under Section 9. The expression "entertain" in Section 9(3) was held to mean consideration on merits, so the prohibition operated even where the application had been instituted earlier. The widening of Section 17 was treated as procedural and clarificatory, and the Court held that once the tribunal was constituted, interim relief ordinarily had to be sought before the tribunal unless the Section 17 remedy would be inefficacious. The Court found no such exceptional circumstance on the facts.

Conclusion: The Court's power to grant interim relief under Section 9 stood curtailed after constitution of the arbitral tribunal, and the appeal was not entitled to interference on merits.

Final Conclusion: The impugned order refusing Section 9 relief was sustained, while limited interim protection by way of status quo was directed for a short period to enable recourse to Section 17 proceedings.

Ratio Decidendi: After constitution of the arbitral tribunal, a court cannot entertain a Section 9 application unless the applicant shows that the remedy under Section 17 would not be efficacious, and this restriction applies to pending court proceedings because it is procedural in nature.

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