Introduction
In Hirani Developers v. Nehru Nagar Samruddhi CHS Ltd. [2026 INSC 484], the Supreme Court considered whether an arbitration clause contained in an earlier development agreement could be incorporated into later agreements by reference.
The Supreme Court held that where a later agreement expressly provides that all terms, conditions and clauses of an earlier agreement shall form part of the later agreement and bind the parties, the arbitration clause contained in the earlier agreement also stands incorporated. The Supreme Court clarified that this was not a case of a mere reference to an earlier document, but a case of incorporation of the earlier agreement in its entirety.
The judgment reiterates the distinction between a general reference to another document and incorporation of that document into a contract especially in context of Section 7(5) of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996. In this article, we navigate through the facts of the case and the findings
