Jupitice launches MSME digital court to resolve SME owners’ commercial disputes

JusTech firm Jupitice Justice Technologies has launched an MSME digital court to resolve the disputes rising in the sector. 

The MSME digital court will be helping the SME owners resolve their commercial disputes through various ADR mechanisms, i.e. arbitration, conciliation, mediation, among others. 

The MSME sector accounted for nearly 30% of India's gross domestic product (GDP) during the financial year of 2019. Besides, various development schemes were also announced to increase the sector’s GDP contribution to 50%.  

However, the sector continues to face multiple challenges, one of which is lack of working capital. Since MSMEs don’t have sufficient security to offer to the bank for raising capital or other alternate ways of raising capital, they continue to work with their limited capital. However, in case of any dispute, the entire capital is bound to get blocked. So, the MSMEs need a speedy justice given the long time taken in litigation in courts. 

The AI-driven platform, through the MSME digital court, will resolve disputes that include civil, commercial, personal and consumers, under the Private Justice System. 

“Jupitice’s MSME digital court is a digital mirror of traditional court with ultra-advanced digital justice infrastructure powered by a complete digital justice ecosystem. This means that an out-of-court settlement through ADR mechanism is now possible, that too all online.  

SME owners or stakeholders won’t have to worry about investing their time, energy, focus, money on resolving disputes via a time-consuming litigation process,” Raman Aggarwal, founder and CEO, Jupitice Justice technologies, said. 

Maharashtra MSMEs had filed 20,463 applications, of which 8,589 are outstanding, according to the dashboard of MSME Samadhan, a delayed payment-monitoring system. With 6,345, out of the total 7,864, Delhi has the second-highest number of outstanding applications in the country and Pune with the fifth highest pendency rate. 

“As a small to mid-level enterprise, getting into a legal suit is probably our worst nightmare. I mean, nobody wants a lawsuit, right? But getting into one means risking our business, capital invested, basically the livelihood of people dependent on companies like us. If there is a way to settle issues or disputes outside of court and if possible, digitally, that would be ideal for all parties,” an MSME owner said 

MSMEs also contribute significantly to job creation, employing around 110 million people across the country.

MSMEs are also connected with the rural economy, as more than half of MSMEs operate in India's rural areas. According to survey estimates, the Covid-19 pandemic disrupted MSMEs profits by 20% to 50%, with micro and small businesses bearing the brunt of the impact, owing to a liquidity crunch.

“The need for an effective use of alternative dispute resolution mechanisms is now more than ever with the on-going pandemic situation. It is high time that people opt for arbitration or mediation mechanisms for quicker dispute resolution, especially with ODR in the scene,” Kshitij R Vyas, former chief justice of Bombay High Court and currently a panelist with Jupitice Justice Technology, said. 

Jupitice has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with India's state-run telecom engineering and consulting company Telecommunications Consultants India Limited (TCIL) for a strategic partnership to promote a private justice delivery platform. 

Launched in May 2021, Jupitice has taken up more than 7000 cases so far.