Stamp duty on arbitral awards is to be worked out on the principal sum alone, the Delhi High Court has held, dismissing a review petition by the National Highways Authority of India, which had argued that a ₹18.34 crore award in favour of Patel KNR Infrastructure was insufficiently stamped.
New Delhi: Interest forming part of the total sum awarded by an Arbitral Tribunal cannot be added to the base on which stamp duty is computed, the Delhi High Court has held, ruling that duty on an arbitral award is payable on the principal amount [Patel KNR Infrastructure Ltd v. National Highways Authority of India].
Justice Jasmeet Singh passed the order on 3 November 2026 in Review Petition No. 292 of 2024, filed by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) in the decree holder’s enforcement petition, OMP (ENF.) (COMM.) 14/2023.
What Section 23 says about interest
Framing the controversy as whether duty was payable on the entire awarded amount including interest, or only on the principal, the Court turned to Section 23, which provides that where interest is expressly made payable by an instrument, it shall not be chargeable with duty higher than it would have been without the mention of interest. The Court held:
“The provision, therefore, makes it clear that the mere inclusion of an interest component in an instrument cannot result in an enhanced stamp duty liability.”
Noting that the award comprised the principal claim and an interest component covering past, pendente lite and future interest, the Court accepted the decree holder’s submission:
“I find merit in this submission. The interest component cannot be included in the computation of stamp duty merely because it forms part of the total amount awarded by the Arbitral Tribunal.”
The order under review and NHAI’s objection
NHAI sought review of an order dated 30 April 2024, by which the execution petition was disposed of with a direction to it to pay the balance interest as per the calculation furnished by Patel KNR Infrastructure Ltd, the decree holder.
NHAI’s principal ground was that the arbitral award dated 18 January 2020, for ₹18,34,02,838, was insufficiently stamped. It contended that stamp duty at 0.1 per cent of the awarded amount came to ₹1,83,402.80, whereas the decree holder had paid only ₹1,18,105, besides ₹500 for stamp paper, so that the award could not have been enforced. NHAI also pointed out that it had deposited ₹24,20,41,861 with the Registry on 23 May 2023, covering the award and interest up to 31 March 2023, which had been released to the decree holder, and argued that no further interest was payable.
Counsel for Patel KNR relied on Section 23 of the Indian Stamp Act, 1899, submitting that the award comprised a principal claim of ₹11,75,05,551 and an interest component of ₹6,48,97,287, and that duty had rightly been paid on the principal alone.
Two decisions that did not help NHAI
NHAI relied on the Madhya Pradesh High Court’s decision in Brajesh Kumar Pannalal v. IndusInd Bank Limited and on Quadrant Televentures Ltd. v. ATC Telecom Infrastructure (P) Ltd. The Court held that the first dealt with when an award must be stamped and when a deficiency objection may be raised, and that neither decision considered the exclusion of interest under Section 23, so neither assisted NHAI.
A review is not an appeal
“It is well settled that the scope of review jurisdiction is limited. A review cannot be treated as an appeal in disguise or an opportunity to re-agitate issues which have already been considered.”
Holding that once interest is excluded “the very basis of the objection raised by the judgment debtor does not survive,” the Court found no error apparent on the face of the record in the 30 April 2024 order, dismissed the review petition and directed that the matter need not be listed further.
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Why the order matters
Stamp-duty objections have become a frequent line of resistance at the execution stage of arbitral awards, particularly where awards carry large interest components built up over years of litigation. By applying Section 23 of the Indian Stamp Act to arbitral awards, the order limits the duty base to the principal sum and removes a ground often used to stall enforcement. It comes as the broader question of how insufficiently stamped domestic awards are to be handled is under consideration, with the Supreme Court on 3 November having stayed two Delhi High Court orders on the procedure while allowing execution proceedings to continue; that stay did not address the interest question.
Case Title: Patel KNR Infrastructure Ltd v. National Highways Authority of India [OMP (ENF.) (COMM.) 14/2023, EX.APPL.(OS) 1218/2024, REVIEW PET. 292/2024]
Bench: Justice Jasmeet Singh, Delhi High Court
Date of Order: November 3, 2026
Appearances: Dr. Swaroop George with Mr. Abhinandan Jain, Mr. Abhigyan Dwivedi, Mr. Shivam Prajapati, Mr. Jatin Sharma and Mr. Kartikey, Advocates, for the Decree Holder; Mr. Balendu Shekhar, CGSC, with Ms. Tanisha Samanta, Mr. Krishna Chaitanya, Mr. Divyansh Singh Dev and Mr. Rajkumar Maurya, Advocates, for NHAI
