Pre-institution mediation under commercial law is not rigidly applied where genuine urgent interim relief is sought and mediation was already attempted.

Section 12A of the Commercial Courts Act requires pre-institution mediation for commercial suits that do not genuinely seek urgent interim relief. Where a suit was filed with an application for interim protection, the court treated the urgency as real, not a device to bypass mediation. Mediation had already been undertaken at the parties' joint request before conversion into a commercial suit and had ended without settlement, so the statutory objective was substantially met. On that basis, the plaint was not liable to rejection for non-compliance with Section 12A, and the objection seeking a fresh round of mediation failed.

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Issues: Whether non-compliance with pre-institution mediation under Section 12A of the Commercial Courts Act, 2015 warranted rejection of the plaint, and whether the suit contemplated urgent interim relief so as to take it outside the mandatory mediation requirement.

Analysis: Section 12A makes pre-institution mediation mandatory for commercial suits that do not contemplate urgent interim relief. The suit was originally filed as an ordinary suit with an application for interim protection, and the court had issued notice on that application and fixed it on a short date in view of the asserted urgency. The interim relief sought was therefore treated as real and not as a device to bypass statutory mediation. The parties had also been referred to mediation at a joint request before the suit was converted into a commercial suit, and that mediation ended without settlement. In those circumstances, the statutory objective of pre-institution mediation stood substantially met, and the defendants could not insist on rejection of the plaint and a fresh round of mediation.

Conclusion: The plaint was not liable to be rejected for want of compliance with Section 12A, and the suit was held to contemplate urgent interim relief. The objection based on non-compliance with pre-institution mediation failed.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a commercial suit genuinely contemplates urgent interim relief, and mediation has already been undertaken in substance before conversion to a commercial suit, Section 12A is not to be applied so rigidly as to require rejection of the plaint or repetition of mediation.

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