Arbitral awards set aside for implausible and contradictory findings on the same evidence in contemporaneous proceedings.

An arbitral award may be set aside under Section 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 where the decision-making process is so internally contradictory and implausible that no reasonable tribunal could reach conflicting conclusions on substantially the same evidence within a short span of time. The Bombay High Court noted that contemporaneous NSE, BSE and MCX proceedings arose from the same trading relationship and relied on the same material, yet the common arbitrator assessed that evidence in diametrically opposite ways. Despite the narrow scope of Section 34 review and the tribunal's primacy on evidence, the Court found the awards unsustainable and quashed them, directing the disputes to proceed before a sole arbitrator appointed by consent.

---

---

Issues: Whether the impugned arbitral awards were liable to be quashed and set aside on the ground that contemporaneous proceedings on substantially the same facts had produced diametrically opposite findings by a common arbitrator, rendering the awards implausible and perverse.

Analysis: The disputes arose from the same trading relationship and relied on the same class of evidence, including trade confirmations, e-mails, SMS alerts, contract notes, ledger entries, and a recorded conversation. The reasoning in the awards showed that the same evidentiary material was assessed in sharply inconsistent ways across the NSE, BSE, and MCX proceedings. In particular, a member of the appellate tribunal had taken one view in one set of proceedings and the opposite view in another set of contemporaneous proceedings on the same factual matrix. The Court held that, although review under Section 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 is narrow and the arbitral tribunal is ordinarily the master of evidence, an award cannot survive where the adjudicatory process is infected by such internal contradiction and implausibility that no reasonable tribunal could reach such conflicting conclusions on the same material within a short span of time.

Conclusion: The awards were quashed and set aside, and the disputes were directed to proceed before a sole arbitrator appointed by consent of the parties.

---