India, Jan. 12 -- As many as six years after the law was amended, the central Government is yet to constitute the Arbitration Council of India to regulate and promote institutional arbitration in the country. Law Ministry officials said it took years for corporates and public sector undertakings to shun ad-hoc arbitration and go far institutional arbitration to settle commercial disputes.

The proposed arbitration council is mandated to regulate institutional arbitration. "But when institutional arbitration has not taken shape in India, who would the arbitration council regulate? Now it has taken shape and within this year, the proposed council will be set up," an official said.

But a former Union law secretary had a contrary view.

"The...