Section 12A. Pre-litigation Mediation and Settlement

12A. Pre-litigation Mediation and Settlement .—(1) A suit, which does not contemplate any urgent interim relief under this Act, shall not be instituted unless the plaintiff exhausts the remedy of prelitigation mediation in accordance with such manner and procedure as may be prescribed by rules made by the Central Government. (2) For the purposes of pre-litigation mediation, the Central Government may, by notification, authorise— (i) the Authority, constituted under the Legal Services Authorities Act, 1987 (39 of 1987); or (ii) a mediation service provider as defined under clause (m) of section 3 of the Mediation Act, 2023. (3) Notwithstanding anything contained in the Legal Services Authorities Act, 1987 (39 of 1987), the Authority or mediation service provider authorised by the Central Government under subsection (2) shall complete the process of mediation within a period of one hundred and twenty days from the date of application made by the plaintiff under sub-section (1): Provided that the period of mediation may be extended for a further period of sixty days with the consent of the parties: Provided further that, the period during which the parties spent for pre-litigation mediation shall not be computed for the purposes of limitation under the Limitation Act, 1963 (36 of 1963). (4) If the parties to the commercial dispute arrive at a settlement, the same shall be reduced into writing and shall be signed by the parties and the mediator. (5) The mediated settlement agreement arrived at under this section shall be dealt with in accordance with the provisions of sections 27 and 28 of the Mediation Act, 2023."; (b) in section 21A, in sub-section (2), for clause (a), the following clause shall be substituted, namely:— "(a) the manner and procedure of pre-litigation mediation under sub-section (1) of section 12A;". THE TENTH SCHEDULE ( See section 65) In the Consumer Protection Act, 2019 (35 of 2019),— (a) in section 2, clauses (25) and (26) shall be omitted; - (b) for section 37, the following sections shall be substituted, namely:— "37. Reference to mediation.—The District Commission or State Commission or the National Commission, as the case may be,[1] [may] at any stage of proceedings refer the disputes for settlement by mediation under the Mediation Act, 2023.