The National Law University Delhi team, comprising E. Sarashika, Rohit Raj, and Ananaya Agrawal, has been adjudged Semi-Finalists of the 28th Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot, Vienna 2021.

This was the biggest Willem C. Vis Moot organised, with over 387 teams participating from 80 jurisdictions. In this prestigious moot court competition, the team made it to the top 4 in the World Rounds, making it to be the best performance of NLU Delhi at this moot, so far.

The team was conferred with the Honorable Mention for Second Runner-Up of the Eric E. Bergsten Award for the Best Team Orals. Both Rohit and Sarashika also received Honorable Mentions for the Martin Domke Award for Best Individual Oralist.

In the lead-up to the competition, the team won several pre-moots such as the 4th DLA Piper St. Petersburg Global Pre-Moot, the 14th Permanent Court of Arbitration Hague Pre-Moot, 7th Brno Vis Pre Moot (Czech Republic), and Swiss Chambers' Arbitration Pre-Moot. They also received awards for emerging as Semi-finalists and for the Best Respondent Memorandum at the 11th Seoul Vis Pre-Moot. They were adjudged Octa-finalists at the ICC Shanghai Vis Pre-Moot as well as the 5th Asian International Arbitration Centre (AIAC) Vis Pre-Moot 2021.

The moot problem this year revolved around a purchase, licensing and collaboration agreement for the development of a vaccine against Covid-19. In addition to the question of contractual breach on grounds of non-conformity, the problem also dealt with the issues of joinder of third parties and remote hearings. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, all rounds of the Vis Vienna commercial arbitration moot were conducted online this year.

(This note was shared by our Campus Ambassador Avinash Kumar Yadav)