Supreme Court Seeks Response from Vedanta: Why Arbitrator Not Appointed to Resolve COREX Dispute

Supreme Court Seeks Response from Vedanta: Why Arbitrator Not Appointed to Resolve COREX Dispute

The Supreme Court by its three judges bench led by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud, Justice P.S. Narasimha and Justice J.B. Pardiwal sought response from Vedanta Limited as to why arbitrator be not appointed to resolve a dispute related to a combined $5-million contract that the resources conglomerate had executed with COREX (UK) in 2018.

COREX UK Limited, involved in core analysis, formation damage and reservoir geology, has alleged that it had "incurred huge losses" on the false guarantees given by Vedanta, which had entered into a contract with the former for providing services related to reservoir characterization and handling core analysis for its petroleum operations in India.

Appearing for COREX, Advocate Utsav Trivedi informed the Court that the company had agreed to provide its services on the assurance given by Vedanta that the total work allotted would be of approximate value of $5 million.

After entering into the contracts, COREX had contributed and made huge investments in setting up its operations in India and in providing quality services at discounted rates on the presumption of expected profits out of the total contract price, according to the Counsel.

COREX contended they have fulfilled all its obligations and duties as per terms of the contracts. However, Vedanta allotted work of less than a million dollars, thus causing substantial loss to it, the appeal stated.

The bench issued notices to Vedanta and listed the matter for 3rd March, 2023.