Delhi High Court order tomorrow on Future Group's plea for direction to Singapore arbitral tribunal to hear termination application

The Delhi High Court will pronounce its order tomorrow at 4.30 pm in Future Group’s pleas seeking directions to arbitration tribunal in Singapore to deal with its termination application [Future Retail Limited v Amazon.com NV Investment Holding LLC and Ors]..On Monday, Justice Amit Bansal heard at length the pleas filed by two companies related to Future Group -- Future Retail Limited (FRL) and Future Coupons Limited (FCRL) -- and said as no proceedings would be affected, he will pass the order tomorrow.The arbitration tribunal in Singapore has been hearing Amazon's arbitration case against Future Group related to its 2019 merger. While hearing this case, the tribunal had passed an interim order which stayed the sale of Future Retail's assets to Reliance Industries. .Senior Advocates Mukul Rohatgi and Harish Salve,appearing for the Future Group, told the Court that they are not asking for termination of arbitration proceedings but only an order directing the tribunal to hear their applications for termination before it proceeds with deciding the damages. The Court was told that the tribunal has fixed January 6 and 7 as dates for determination of damages and therefore the termination application should be heard on January 5.Rohatgi argued that arbitration proceedings have reached a turning point after the Competition Commission of India (CCI) recently suspended its clearance given to Amazon and Future’s 2019 deal.Rohatgi submitted that the CCI order destroys the agreement between the two companies and therefore, nothing under that agreement, including the arbitration proceedings, can go on.“If the CCI approval goes then agreement goes and therefore nothing can continue under the agreement. If nothing can continue under the agreement then this arbitration is a pursuit of illegality,” he argued.Salve, meanwhile, questioned the way the tribunal has proceeded in the matter, stating that almost everything that his clients have asked for has gotten rejected.“My client is on the verge of bankruptcy. Amazon has a budget of ₹8,500 crore to fight its legal battles. We don't have that kind of budget,” he told the Court.It was further argued that the only reason Amazon was interested in the case was to prevent the deal between Future Retail and Reliance Industries Limited..Senior advocates Gopal Subramanium and Amit Sibal however contended that an appeal will be filed by Amazon challenging the CCI order and that arbitration clause does not perish with agreement since there was permission existing for the deal on the date when the agreement happened.Both the advocates also said that it is not that the tribunal said it will not hear Future Group's termination application. In fact, the counsel argued, the tribunal has set January 8 as the date for hearing of the application. “It is with some sheepishness that the present petitions have been preferred. The tribunal has responded in real time and accommodated the parties… Both these petitions are infructuous and immature at the same time. The grievance is that there is no date fixed even though the Tribunal has said that it will hear the termination application on January 8,” Sibal submitted..The Amazon-Future Group deal has seen several legal battles as a result of which the sale of Future’s assets to Reliance has been stalled.The deal, apart from being subject of arbitration before Singapore tribunal, has done the rounds of Delhi Court as well as Supreme Court.Last month, Amazon had moved the Delhi High Court challenging the probe initiated by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) into the deal. The company had termed the investigation a “fishing and roving” inquiry, adding that the ED had sought details of privileged legal advice and opinions from Amazon and other information not connected with the Future group deal.Recently, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) had suspended the clearance for the deal stating that Amazon had failed to notify CCI about certain crucial details of its acquisition of 49 percent stake in Future, as required under Section 6(2) of the Competition Act, 2002 (Act).It had, therefore, also imposed of a penalty of ₹202 crores on Amazon.