SRINAGAR: The Jammu Kashmir and Ladakh High Court has dismissed three revision petitions filed by Kashmir Confectionary Store, Mehak Trading Co. and Naugraein Traders, upholding orders allowing the execution of arbitration awards in favour of Mother Choice Health Care India over unpaid dues for supplied goods.
Justice Sanjay Dhar, in an order dated September 30, 2026, held that the objections raised by the petitioners did not provide grounds to interfere with the orders passed by the Principal District Judge, Jammu, on July 20, 2026.
The petitioners had argued that the arbitration awards were legally invalid because Mother Choice Health Care India was allegedly not registered under the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Act, 2006, when the supplies were made in 2014-15. They contended that the Himachal Pradesh Micro and Small Enterprises Facilitation Council, Shimla, lacked the authority to refer the disputes for arbitration.
Rejecting the argument, Justice Dhar noted that the respondent had produced an Udyog Aadhaar Memorandum certificate showing its registration under the MSME Act with effect from April 1, 2010.
The court observed that the enterprise had re-registered in 2020 in accordance with a Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises notification issued on June 26 that year. The petitioners had apparently mistaken the re-registration for the firm’s first registration, the court said.
The judge further held that even if the respondent had not been registered under the MSME Act at the relevant time, that fact alone would not render the arbitration awards null and void.
In reaching this conclusion, the court relied on the Supreme Court’s judgment in NBCC (India) Ltd. v. State of West Bengal and others (2025 INSC 54), which addressed the ability of the Micro and Small Enterprises Facilitation Council to entertain references under Section 18 of the MSME Act involving enterprises that were not registered under Section 8.
The dispute arose from three separate transactions involving the supply of goods. Mother Choice Health Care India approached the Facilitation Council to recover outstanding payments. After conciliation failed, the council referred the disputes to arbitration under Section 18(3) of the MSME Act.
The arbitrator subsequently issued three separate awards, two dated October 19, 2023, and one dated April 22, 2023. Mother Choice Health Care India initiated execution proceedings before the District Judge, Solan, in Himachal Pradesh. Those proceedings were later transferred to Jammu.
The three petitioners then challenged the execution proceedings through separate applications under Section 47 read with Section 151 of the Code of Civil Procedure. The Principal District Judge, Jammu, dismissed those applications on July 20, 2026, prompting the revision petitions before the High Court.
After examining the submissions and records, Justice Dhar found no legal basis to overturn the lower court’s decisions and dismissed all three petitions as lacking merit.
