In the case of 'Magic Eye Developers Private Limited Vs Green
Edge Infrastructure Private Limited and Others', (2023) 8 SCC 50, the
Supreme Court of India was examining the jurisdiction of the referral Court at
the pre-referral stage. It was held that pre-referral jurisdiction of the Court
under Section 11 (6) of the 1996 Act is very narrow and primarily two
inquiries have to be made, the primary inquiry being about the existence and
validity of an arbitration agreement and the second being with respect to non-
32. It is also pertinent to note that the case of Magic Eye Developers
Private Limited (Supra), relied upon by the respondent considered whether
the disputes fell under MOU-2 which did not contain a valid arbitration
agreement or was the MOU-2 required to be read with other Agreements
which contained an arbitration clause? In this factual background, the Apex
Court observed that a finding on whether the Agreement was valid or not, is
required to be given at the referral stage. The Impugned order which did not
finally decide the issue conclusively and left it to the Arbitral Tribunal by
stating that "this Court cannot finally pronounce one way or the other on
this aspect", was set aside. The case does not aid the case of the respondent
as in the present case there is a valid arbitral Agreement and the plea of
Novation can be effectively agitated before the learned Arbitrator.