Future Retail v Amazon: Future Moves Delhi High Court Against Interim Order For Status Quo On Stake Sale To Reliance

Future Retail Ltd has today filed an appeal against an order by the Single Judge bench of Justice Midha passed yesterday directing maintenance of status quo, on its Rs. 25,000 cr retail stake sale deal with Reliance.

The appeal was brought up in an urgent mentioning today before the bench of Chief Justice DN Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh and will be heard tomorrow.

The appeal which was urgently mentioned by Sr. Adv. Darius Khambata has been preferred under O.XLIII of the Civil Procedure Code. Khambata prayed for the case to be heard today itself in the afternoon, however, the bench has said it will hear the appeal tomorrow.

Hearing a plea by Amazon Inc against the Future Retail Ltd (FRL) and Reliance Industries' retail stake sale deal worth Rs. 25,000 cr approved by a Board Resolution of FRL last year, the Delhi High Court yesterday granted interim relief to Amazon directing all authorities and parties to maintain status quo on the deal until a detailed interim order on the case.

The bench of Justice Midha also gave a strong prima facie view in Amazon's favour that as opposed to FRL's plea that the Award was a nullity, the Emergency Award is infact enforceable under Section 17 (2) of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, and therefore directed FRL to bring on record all steps and actions taken by it towards the deal, after the award of the Emergency Arbitrator was passed on the arbitration on Oct 25, 2020

The Delhi High Court had earlier issued notice on Amazon's plea seeking interim injunction against Future Retail Ltd (FRL) and Reliance Industries Ltd's deal worth nearly Rs. 25000 crores, and sought clarity on the factual position of all parties involved. The bench of Justice Midha had also directed the parties to submit a note on their factual positions and legal propositions.

Earlier, Sr. Adv. Darius Khambata, appearing for FRL, had argued that even under the SIAC Rules, which govern the arbitration agreement between the parties, the Emergency Arbitrator is not the tribunal; and further submitted that the Single Judge Bench order of Justice Mukta Gupta too, had not held anywhere that the Emergency Arbitrator's award was to be treated as an order under Section 17 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, therefore the award was not enforceable under S.17.

However, strongly objecting to Khambata's submission, Sr. Adv. Gopal Subramanium appearing on behalf of Amazon today submitted that FRL could not unilaterally declare an otherwise valid award as a nullity qua itself, whereas for all other parties to the Arbitration agreement the award was still valid and binding.