' This Suit is based on an Award dated 10-8-1982, made by Mr. Kashif Murtaza, Deputy Secretary, Ministry of Industries and Mineral Development Department, Government of Punjab, whereby a claim of the Government of Punjab, against their Clearing and Forwarding Agents M/s. Dadabhoy Hormusjee & Sons, has been allowed.
2 The Award in this case is, inter alia, assailed on the ground that the Plaintiffs had been making payments to the Defendant's Clearing Agents at 10% of "C & F' value, on the basis of the mutually acceptable interpretation of the expression "C&F Value" as given in the Note attached to Para 4 of the Contract. However, when the relationship between the parties ended, after having remained in operation from 22-5-1974 to October, 1979, and the Defendants sought to claim their security deposit of Rs, 25,000 (Rupees twenty five thousands) the Plaintiffs, in response, claimed that the defendants had over-charged and were liable for reimbursement. As a result, acting on Clause 11 of the Contract the matter was referred to Arbitration and the Arbitrator, even though he observed, that "the Directorate of Industries conceded the point that if the calculation of the commission charges was carried out in accordance with the Note referred to above, then of course, nothing was outstanding from the Forwarding Agents" yet came to the conclusion that the defendants have overcharged.
3. The disposal of this case basically hinges on the interpretation of the expression "C&F Value" as it occurs in Para 4 of the Contract. In the Note appearing in that paragraph, such value is defined to mean "the amount mentioned in the Bills of Entry and accepted by the Customs Authorities on assessm ent of duty and sales tax". The contention of Mr. K.M. Nadeem for the plaintiffs, is that this definition of the expression applies only to Part (ii) of Paragraph 4, and not to part (i) of the said paragraph. This argument lacks consistency because if the expression "C&F Value" was defined for payment to the Commission Agents in two, more or less similar situations, there is no justification in applying such definition only to one of the situations and excluding the other altogether. There is another reason why this interpretation is unacceptable. It is shown to me by Mr. Akram Zuberi for the defendants, that in the new Contracts, which the Plaintiffs have been awarding presently, relevant Paragraph 3, of the Tender Notice (Page 97 of the File) clearly shows that the Plaintiffs, for all purposes, and in both the above situations, now treat "C&F Value" to be the same for payment to Commission Agents. In other words, the Plaintiffs themselves now have accepted, for their present purposes, the definition of "C&F Value" to be the same as is claimed by the Defendants.
4. The question still is whether the Arbitrator has misconducted himself or the proceedings and in answer to that MrAkram Zuberi relies on the document dated 7-9-1981, titled as "Tender Notice" which, according to him was placed with the Arbitrator, and in such document, as adverted to above, the current position with regard to "C&F Value" of the Plaintiffs was duly reflected but, unfortunately, the learned Arbitrator failed to take note of this important evidential document. This being so and the Arbitrator having ignored an important piece of evidence on record before him, it is patent that he misconducted the proceedings pending before him. Besides, now, in view of the newly inserted section 26-A in the Arbitration Act, 1940, whereby an Arbitrator is required to give reasons for the Award, a heavier responsibility lies on such domestic forums to deal with all matters going to the root of the dispute and failure to do so would constitute misconduct, for the requirement, to give reasons, is not a meaningless exercise.
5. In the foregoing view of the matter, a case for setting aside of the Award has been made out and the same, accordingly is so set aside.
Award set aside.