No copy of the award which has been registered was served on the respondent and thus the occasion to file any objection under Section 34 of the Act did not arise

Two execution petitions (Execution Petition No. 35 and 36/2004) were filed by Shri Anurag Malik and Smt. Kamlesh Malik both for execution of the arbitral award dated 03.06.2001. The objections against the arbitral award were filed in the executionproceedings by Shri Amit Malik (appellant herein). The objections of Shri Amit Malik against the arbitral award in question are to the following effect:

(i) No copy of the award which has been registered was served on the respondent and thus the occasion to file any objection under Section 34 of the Act did not arise;

11. We have gone through the arbitral award dated 03.06.2001 and we are in complete agreement with the above reasonings given by the learned Single Judge regarding supply of copy of the said award to the appellant. The appellant has not disputed that the arbitral award dated 03.06.2001 bears his signatures. This shows the knowledge of the appellant about the contents of the award. He has nowhere whispered that he was not supplied with the copy of the award dated 03.06.2001 which admittedly bears his signatures. Admittedly, the objections against the arbitral award dated 03.06.2001 were filed by the appellant in 2004 when the other side applied for execution of the said award. Here the question that confront us is whether the objections filed by the appellant against the arbitral award dated 03.06.2001 in execution proceedings initiated in 2004 were legally maintainable? Limitation for filing of objections against the arbitral award is governed by the provisions of Section 34(3) of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 (hereinafter to be referred as 'the Act of 1996'). A bare reading of the Act of 1996 would show that an application for setting aside the award can be filed within three months from the date of receiving the copy of the award. However, proviso to Section 34(3) empowers the Court to entertain an application within a further period of 30 days on showing sufficient cause by the applicant. The expression ?entertain the application within a further period of 30 days but not thereafter? used in the proviso to Section 34(3) is couched in the negative which clearly shows that the same is mandatory in character.

13. In the present case, the arbitral award was made and published on 03.06.2001. This award bears the signatures of both the parties. The appellant has not disputed that the copy of the award dated 03.06.2001 which bears his signatures was supplied to him. What he has disputed is that the copy of the award which was got registered on 10.01.2002 was not supplied to him. This, in our view, is a hyper-technical objection and is not sustainable in law. Since the appellant had got copy of the arbitral award dated 03.06.2001, the limitation for filing of objections against the said award commenced from that date. Admittedly, no objections against the award were filed by the appellant for more than 2? years and thereby he allowed the limitation to expire. Section 36 of the Act of 1996 provides that an arbitral award is enforceable before the Court as a decree of the Court. Since limitation for filing of objections against the arbitral award in question had expired long back prior to the filing of execution petitions by the respondents, neither the objections nor the additional objections were maintainable in execution proceedings. This is in consonance with the objective to be achieved by getting the dispute resolved through an alternative mechanism of arbitration which is a forum of the choice of the parties. If the objections against the arbitral award are entertained beyond the period prescribed in Section 34(3) of the Act of 1996, then it would frustrate the very object for which which this Act has been enacted. Hence, we are of the view that the objections against the arbitral award in question filed by the appellant before the learned Single Judge in execution proceedings were hopelessly barred by limitation.