TALE OF CITIES

Adhoc vs Institutional Arbitration

Conducting efficient International Arbitration

Rise of Investment Treaty Arbitration; and

What’s happening in India with a special session on Arbitration and Conciliation (Amendment) Act, 2015

A number of eminent senior advocates, Sharat S. Javali, Raju Ramachandran, P.S. Narasimha ASG, Hon’ble Justice Subhash Adi, Uplokayukta Karnataka State and Kiran Javali Advocate, other members of the Bar and General Counsels were also present at the Arbitration Conference. The deliberations of the conference chiefly emphasized on some practical and useful suggestions from speakers across leading arbitration jurisdictions in the world who provided a global perspective to the Indian business community on important trends and practices currently prevailing in international commercial arbitration.

Fali S. Nariman, Senior Advocate, Supreme Court of India gave an excellent key note address at the conference and set the tone for the rest of the day.

Justice, A.K. Sikri chaired the first session on “Tale of International Cities and lent his expert views. Prof. Sundra Rajoo, Director of Kuala Lumpur Regional Centre for Arbitration spoke on the Internationalisation of Institutional Arbitration. He said that that with the rise on cross border trade and the increase of international arbitration, the arbitration fraction struggled to fit the role of the national courts. The landscape of international trade today warrants the internationalisation of arbitration. It is mandatory and not optional, also arbitration has to be cost effective, flexible and quick.

Briana Young, Herbert Smith Freehills, spoke on the recent developments in Hong Kong. Maria Beatrice Deli, Secretary General, ICC Italy and Prof. Giacomo Rojas, Milan spoke on Administered Arbitration by ICC and Institutional Arbitration as opposed to Adhoc Arbitration respectively.

Justice S. Murlidhar, Judge Delhi High Court chaired the second session on “Strategies and Case Management Practices in International Arbitration. Simon Kverndal, QC, Quadrant Chambers, London and Ranjeeta Kaur spoke on “Arbitrator bias”.

Mr. Kverndal said that commercial parties cherish the right to appoint their own arbitrator and to choose from a pool which includes those currently practising as lawyers or other professionals. Doubts about impartiality inevitably arise but a balance is needed between ensuring a fair tribunal and not allowing a wriggling respondent to use allegations of risk of bias to disrupt the process. Robust and effective principles and procedures are needed. He argued that detailed inflexible rules (e.g. the Red/Orange Lists of the IBA Guidelines 2014) are less fair/effective than a simple overarching test for apparent bias, rigorous disclosure requirements for arbitrators and case-by-case adjudication by arbitral institutions or national courts.

Hussein Haeri, Partner Withers, London spoke on the Insights of conducting an efficient Arbitral Proceeding. He highlighted on four aspects: the Importance of drafting an arbitration agreement; Choice of arbitral rules; Designing the arbitration process and Managing the arbitration process.

Martin F. Gusy of K&L Gates LLP New York gave a lecture on “Strategies and Case Management Practices in International Arbitration – Saving Time and Costs – International Arbitration without a Hearing on the Merits?”. Mr. Gusy, K&L Gates’ U.S. Head of International Arbitration, explained how dispositive motions are common practice in U.S. litigation, have made it into U.S. domestic arbitration rules, first surfaced in the 2006 ICSID Arbitration Rule 41(5) on the international stage, and were most recently included in Rule 29 of the August 2016 SIAC Arbitration Rules.