On 26 November 2019 a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court, in Perkins Eastman Architects DPC v. HSCC (India) Ltd, extended TRF v. Energo from the narrow case of an ineligible MD nominating himself a substitute to the broader principle that a person who is himself statutorily ineligible by reason of interest in the dispute cannot — even where he does not appoint himself — be the unilateral appointing authority. The Court appointed an independent sole arbitrator under Section 11(6). A close reading of Justice Uday Umesh Lalit's judgment, the doctrinal architecture, and the recalibration by the Constitution Bench in Central Organisation for Railway Electrification (8 November 2024).
On 3 July 2017 a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court, in TRF Ltd v. Energo Engineering Projects Ltd, held that where an arbitration clause authorises the Managing Director of a party to act as sole arbitrator or to nominate one, and that MD is statutorily ineligible under Section 12(5) read with the Seventh Schedule of the Arbitration & Conciliation Act, 1996, the MD cannot act as arbitrator and equally cannot nominate a substitute — 'once the infrastructure collapses, the superstructure is bound to collapse.' A close reading of Justice Dipak Misra's judgment, the doctrinal architecture, the 2015 Amendment background and what the holding seeded for Perkins Eastman and Central Organisation for Railway Electrification.