COMPARISON BETWEEN ARBITRATION PROCEEDINGS UNDER ARBITRATION ACT OF 1940 AND INTERNATIONAL RULES OF ARBITRATION FOR LARGE SCALE CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS OF PAKISTAN

Abstract

The construction industry around the world is labor intensive and generates huge amounts of revenue. Both public and private sectors are involved in in this industry and it produces employments and facilities across the world. In modern competitive business environment of CI the disputes are inevitable and considering the pace of works and cost involved, the industry professionals endeavor to resolve these disputes as early as possible and within minimum possible costs. Conventionally, litigation was the only way of dispute settlement however after advent of knowledge, various alternate dispute resolution techniques have emerged out of which Arbitration has been the most prominent and favored one as it generates a legally binding decision without the hassle of conventional litigation. Like rest of the world, CI of Pakistan also deploys Arbitration as a dispute resolution mechanism under Arbitration Act of Pakistan 1940. This is an old enactment based on British law that has posed various problems in practice. This research is focused on the problems posed by the application of Arbitration Act and compared it with internationally accepted ICC and UNCITRAL rules to suggest improvements in local Arbitration process. In order to achieve the objectives, the differences among ICC, UNCITRAL and Arbitration Act were formulated and discussed with imminent industry professional on the basis of semi-structured interview question and in depth qualitative non-statistical textual analysis was conducted on the basis of thematic coding using advanced computer softwares like IBM SPSS Data Collection, Provalis QDA Miner and MS Excel. As a result of this analysis and in depth literature review, cognitive results were deduced and it was proposed that in Pakistan UNCITRAL rules of Arbitration can be adopted after certain amendments and tailoring it our specific needs. It was argued in the research that the adoption of these rules will not only facilitate the Arbitration proceedings by settlement of disputes in much lesser time with reduced cost but also promote the utility of Arbitration as a dispute resolution mechanism in Pakistan. Finally the research was concluded with the recommendations to improve the Arbitration process for CI of Pakistan and various aspects were also highlighted that could prove a corner stone for future research.