Delhi High Court directs Delhi Metro to pay entire arbitral award amount to Anil Ambani's DAMEPL by May 31

In a blow to the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC), the Delhi High Court on Thursday directed it to pay the entire amount awarded to Anil Ambani-owned Delhi Airport Metro Express Private Limited (DAMEPL) by an arbitral tribunal [Delhi Airport Metro Express Private Limited v. Delhi Metro Rail Corporation Ltd]..In his judgment, Justice Suresh Kumar Kait said while a part-payment has to be made from DMRC’s ‘Total DMRC Funds’ head within two weeks from the order, the remaining amounts are to be paid in two equal instalments in the next two months.“The first instalment shall be paid on or before 30.04.2022 and the second instalment shall be made on or before 31.05.2022,” the Court has said..The judgment was pronounced in an execution petition filed by Reliance Infrastructure’s subsidiary DAMEPL, seeking enforcement of an arbitral award which, it is claimed, amounts to ₹8000 crore.The award arises out of an agreement signed between the DMRC and DAMEPL in 2008 to develop and operate the orange line of the Delhi Metro that connects Indira Gandhi International Airport's Terminal-3 to Dwarka Sector-21..During the course of the hearing, the Central government and DMRC had said that the Delhi Metro does not have enough funds to pay such a large amount. A suggestion was made by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta that the government be allowed to deal directly with the banks, and the money can be paid directly to them.This was refuted by DAMEPL, which said it needed the entire amount in an escrow account. The company had said that both the Delhi High Court and the Supreme Court had upheld the award, and therefore, the money should be paid..While the judgment now says that the DAMEPL has claimed that the total arbitral award along with all the interest amounts to over ₹8000 crore, the figure has been disputed by the DMRC, which has paid ₹1678 crore till now.The order does not say as to how much money is still owed by DMRC. .However, the High Court has said that the award has attained finality and cannot be allowed to remain as a paper award. Therefore, the DMRC is duty bound to either divert its funds shown under various heads after seeking permission of Central government, or raise loans to satisfy the award, the Court said. .The Court was told that there are broadly three heads under which money is available with DMRC. While the amount under 'Total DMRC Funds' is ₹1452 crore, ₹2681 crore was available under the head 'Total Project Funds'. Under the 'Total Other Funds', there was ₹1,560 crore.DMRC argued that a sum of ₹514 crore of this is committed to the salary, medical and post-retiral benefits of employees, while ₹114 crore is the portion of security deposit on smart cards, which is refundable to commuters.The Court, therefore, said that the DMRC should keep the ₹628 crores available under the Total DMRC Funds for statutory expenses and pay the rest of the amount to DAMEPL in two weeks.“In the considered opinion of this Court, the said amount i.e. Rs.514+ Rs.114 crores has to be kept aside for the aforesaid purpose, however, from the remaining amount available in different bank accounts of judgment debtor as well as under other heads, the payments towards decreetal amount has to be made. The award dated 11.05.2017 has attained finality and cannot be allowed to remain as a paper award, therefore, the judgment debtor is duty bound to either divert its finds shown to be available in different heads mentioned in the affidavit of 14.02.2022 after seeking permission of the Central Government, if necessary, or raise loans to satisfy the award.”.On the plea raised by a number of banks demanding that if the DMRC indeed pays the amount, it should directly come to them since Anil Ambani owes several thousand crores to them, the Court has said that this prayer cannot be entertained in the present petition. "Without going into the depth of claims raised by the applicants, I find that for any outstanding dues payable by the decree holder to these applicants, separate proceedings are required to be initiated and applicants cannot be permitted to settle their scores in the present petition.".Senior Advocate Rakesh Khanna along with Advocates Mahesh Agarwal, Rishi Agrawala, Megha Mehta, Niyati Kohli, Pranjit Bhattacharya and Manavi Agarwal appeared for DAMEPL.DMRC was represented by Senior Advocates Parag Tripathi and Ajit Kumar Sinha along with Advocates Tarun Johri, R Srinivasan and Vishwajeet Tyagi.Senior Advocate Ramji Srinivasan along with Advocates PBA Srinivasan, PS Chandralekha and Parth Tandon appeared for the banks..[Read judgment]