By Binay Kumar, Advocate-on-Record, Supreme Court of India
Case: M/s Royal Construction Company Pvt. Ltd. v. M/s National Projects Construction Corporation • 2026 INSC 1167 • Judgment: 28 Oct 2026 • Reportable
An award is not effective until its benefit can be realised
An arbitration system may dispose of disputes more quickly than ordinary litigation and still fail the party who has won. In Royal Construction, the Supreme Court confronted that problem through a dispute over an arbitral award rendered in 2002 and still embroiled in enforcement litigation more than twenty-four years later. The immediate appeal was narrow, involving the effect of an earlier answer to a substantial question of law concerning conversion of an award denominated in foreign currency. The Court’s wider observations, however, asked whether India’s award-execution machinery matches the promise of arbitration as an effective dispute-resolution mechanism.
How the procedural history became the problem
An internationally seated arbitral award was made in favour of Royal Construction. Various court proceedings concerned the award and whether, and when, the amounts expressed in foreign currency could be converted into Indian rupees. In 2023 the Supreme Court answered a certified substantial question, declining to specify a conversion date and preserving the underlying award and the earlier judicial directions. In later execution proceedings, disputes arose over sums said to have been paid or withdrawn in rupees years earlier. The parties returned seeking clarification, although those payment questions had not formed part of the previously certified question (paragraphs 4–6).
Why clarification could not replace execution adjudication
The Court held that its earlier appellate jurisdiction had been confined to the certified question of law. Once answered, the scope of that adjudication was exhausted. The Supreme Court could not be invited, under the label of clarification, to assume continuous supervision of the executing court or decide new disputed facts about deposits, withdrawal and adjustment. Those matters belonged before the executing forum and any appellate court competent to review its orders. The related miscellaneous application was dismissed, while the parties remained free to press adjustment or set-off submissions before the executing court (paragraphs 7–10 and 18–22).
The institutional concern in the epilogue
The judgment then moved from the particular procedural impasse to a measured institutional diagnosis. The Court noted that an award issued in 2002 was still being contested at the recovery stage. An arbitral regime must be judged not only by the speed of the award or limits on judicial challenge, but also by whether the successful party obtains the benefit within a reasonable period. Under section 36 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, enforcement proceeds in the manner of a decree, drawing upon the Civil Procedure Code machinery. Repetitive objections, incomplete asset information and fragmented execution processes can each frustrate practical recovery (paragraphs 11–13).
A request for reform, not a new statutory rule
The Court requested the Law Commission of India to undertake a focused study of enforcement and execution, including comparative procedures, the identification of award-debtor assets and whether domestic and foreign awards require distinct treatment. It directed that a copy of the judgment be forwarded to the Commission. That is a significant institutional referral, but it is not itself an amendment to section 36, a statutory deadline or an order adopting a foreign execution model. The discretion to propose reforms remained with the Commission, and the adjudication of this particular payment controversy remained with the appropriate executing forum (paragraphs 14–17).
What this means for commercial disputants
Commercial counsel should examine enforcement before, not only after, obtaining the award. Documentation of the debtor’s assets, preservation of payment records, currency clauses and the mechanics of partial satisfaction can prevent later disputes from becoming a second litigation cycle. Award debtors remain entitled to raise legally available objections; the Court did not suggest that procedural fairness can be discarded in the name of speed. The deeper question is how a system can decide necessary objections efficiently while preventing their serial repetition. Royal Construction does not answer that legislative question, but it frames it more sharply than routine commentary on arbitration’s supposed speed.
A joined-up approach to arbitration coverage
Read with South Bihar Power (2026 INSC 1165) on the proper court for extending an arbitrator’s mandate and Shreeram Builders (2026 INSC 1176) on fidelity to agreed contract terms, this judgment maps three different pressure points: getting the tribunal’s jurisdiction and timetable right, ensuring the award respects the parties’ contract, and enforcing the final outcome. None can substitute for the others. A legally valid award that cannot be collected is commercially incomplete; an efficiently enforced award that exceeded authority is equally problematic. The law must attend to all three.
The difference between answering a question and reopening a case
The earlier Supreme Court proceedings addressed a certified substantial legal question associated with converting foreign-currency amounts. The later dispute concerned what had allegedly been deposited, paid or withdrawn, and whether an adjustment should follow. Those factual matters could not be imported into the earlier appellate question through an application styled as clarification. The Court identified the executing court and the competent appellate forum as the institutions equipped to decide those questions on a properly developed record. Its answer guarded the boundary of appellate jurisdiction without foreclosing lawful arguments about set-off in execution (paragraphs 7–10 and 18–22).
The institutional diagnosis is broader than the immediate appeal
An award rendered in 2002 remained under enforcement dispute more than twenty-four years later. The Court viewed that delay as capable of frustrating the commercial purpose of arbitration even where the arbitral tribunal has resolved the merits. It identified specific weaknesses worthy of study: disclosure of award-debtor assets, coordination of execution methods, repetitive objections, and the time required to achieve actual realisation. Those points are in the Court’s epilogue, not an enactment of new execution procedures. Paragraphs 11–14 request a focused study by the Law Commission of India, including whether domestic and foreign awards need distinct enforcement processes or a common framework with safeguards.
An agenda for the practitioner, not a new rule of law
The most immediate litigation lesson concerns preparation of the execution record. An award-holder should assemble the authenticated award, prior orders, foreign-currency provisions, existing payments, available asset information and a chronology of any objections. The award-debtor should identify genuinely disputed adjustments and the evidentiary basis for each rather than relitigate matters already decided. The judgment also supplies a disciplined way to speak about reform: there is a request to study obstacles and make recommendations; no new limitation period, automatic recovery mechanism or independent enforcement tribunal has been created by this decision. That distinction should lead every social-media adaptation.
Judgment and paragraph references
M/s Royal Construction Company Pvt. Ltd. v. M/s National Projects Construction Corporation, 2026 INSC 1167, decided 28 Oct 2026. Primary source: judgment of the Supreme Court of India. Principal analysis references: ¶¶ 4–16, 18–22 (especially ¶¶ 9–14 and ¶¶ 20–22).
Related Supreme Court analysis
- Related analysis: who can extend an arbitrator’s mandate under Section 29A?
- Related analysis: arbitrators and contractual limits
Case reference
M/s Royal Construction Company Pvt. Ltd. v. M/s National Projects Construction Corporation • 2026 INSC 1167 • Judgment: 28 Oct 2026 • Reportable. Source: Supreme Court of India judgment, 28 October 2026.
Author: Binay Kumar, Advocate-on-Record, Supreme Court of India; The Justice Law Partners.
Related reading: Dispute Resolution & Litigation · Supreme Court Daily Updates.
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