Centre launches contractual dispute settlement scheme

The Centre on Wednesday launched a settlement scheme for contractual disputes with vendors or suppliers to government and has set October 31 as the deadline for submitting claims for consideration.

The scheme was announced by the Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in budget this year.

The Department of Expenditure had already came up with the guidelines for the claims in May.


“The scheme will apply to all domestic contractual disputes where one of the parties is either the Government of India or an organisation working under its control,” the Finance Ministry said in a statement.

For cases involving Court awards, the settlement amount offered to the contractor will be up to 85% of the net amount awarded or upheld by the court, while the same threshold will be “up to” 65% of the net amount in case of arbitral awards.

“The Government e-Marketplace (GeM) has developed a dedicated web-page for implementation of this scheme and eligible claims shall be processed only through GeM,” the Ministry said.

Separately Ministry of Railways’ contractors can register their claims on the Indian Railways E-Procurement System.