Legality and Fairness of Arbitral Awards : An Overview

Arbitration, though not totally devoid of some inherent legal issues, has come to be recognized as more effective than litigation. The reason for this development could be attributed among other things, to the craving need to get speedy and substantial justice without being hampered by the legal technicalities which characterizes the traditional litigation system. In the light of these, this article seeks to analyse the various aspects of domestic as well as international commercial arbitration, in particular, the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 to find out the extent to which the requirements of fairness and choice of law contained therein contribute to the ultimate objective of delivering speedy and substantial justice. Also analysed are the choice of applicable law contained in major arbitral institutional rules and their effectiveness. Finally, the issues on the proposed amendments to some of the provisions of the above mentioned Act along with its necessity and implications and the issue as to whether the Indian law in this regard is in tune with existing international standards or not, are dealt with