Commercial Court Lawyer in Delhi: Recovery, Contract and Brand Disputes for Delhi Businesses

What a commercial court lawyer in Delhi does for a business

Most of it is unglamorous. Someone owes money and won't pay. A contract has gone sour, a lease has turned into a fight, or a competitor is trading on your name. If it's worth Rs 3 lakh or more, it belongs in the courts set up under the Commercial Courts Act, 2015, and that's where we work: recovery suits, summary suits, injunctions, trademark and copyright cases, defending suits filed against you, appeals and execution. A lot of the real work happens before the first hearing. The legal notice, the compulsory mediation under Section 12A, the choice of court and a plaint drafted to the commercial rules all come first.

We work out of our own office in Dwarka, New Delhi. We're in the district commercial courts all over Delhi, and in the Delhi High Court. Advocate B.K. Singh leads the commercial side of the firm. Advocate Sadhna Singh works on these files with him and runs the day-to-day recovery and commercial court work. There's a second office in Vaishali, Ghaziabad. Useful, when the other party sits across the border in Noida or Ghaziabad.

What follows is the practical side. Which court you'll be in, what happens first, how long it all takes, what you'll spend apart from our fees, and the mistakes we keep seeing. If you'd like to read about the courts themselves, we've got separate pages on the district commercial courts in Delhi and the Commercial Division of the Delhi High Court.

Which Delhi court hears your case: the Rs 3 lakh and Rs 2 crore lines

Two numbers decide where you file. From Rs 3 lakh to Rs 2 crore, the suit goes to the District Judge (Commercial Court) at one of the district complexes. Over Rs 2 crore, you're on the original side of the Delhi High Court, in its Commercial Division. Rs 3 lakh is the specified value under Section 2(1)(i) of the Act. How to count it is in Section 12. For a money claim, you add interest up to the day of filing to the principal.

The Rs 2 crore figure has been in place since 2015, under the Delhi High Court Act. It may not last. A committee of Delhi High Court judges was formed in December 2025 to look at raising what the district courts can hear, and in 2026 there were reports of a recommendation for a big increase, with the High Court Bar against it. Nothing changes until an amendment is formally made and notified. Until then, it's Rs 2 crore. Verify the figure the week you file, because a plaint in the wrong court comes back to you. It isn't transferred.

Under Rs 3 lakh, a business claim is an ordinary civil suit before the Civil Judge, and the commercial timelines don't apply. Some quarrels aren't commercial whatever their size, a family partition or a flat purchase for instance, and the Act doesn't touch them. Value also fixes your court fee and your appeal route. Work it out properly on day one.

Delhi's judicial districts and where their courts sit

Territorial jurisdiction: which district, and suing someone outside Delhi

Within Delhi, Section 20 of the Code of Civil Procedure gives you a choice. You can file where the defendant lives or does business, or where all or part of the cause of action arose. The catch is that district lines run along police station areas, which often don't match what people call a neighbourhood. The old walled city falls in more than one district, for instance. So use the table as a rough guide. Before we file anything, we check the police station for the defendant's address, the delivery point and the place where payment was due.

A defendant in Noida, Gurugram, Faridabad or another state can still be sued in Delhi if some part of the cause of action arose here. Picture a Delhi supplier that took the order at its Delhi office, dispatched from its Delhi godown and expected payment into a Delhi bank account. It has a Delhi connection. The same logic works against you. Perform a contract in Noida or Gurugram and you can be sued there. Our pages on the Noida commercial court and the Gurugram commercial court cover those courts.

First, though, find the jurisdiction clause. A lot of contracts say disputes go only to courts at New Delhi, or only to Mumbai. Courts usually enforce that, provided the chosen court had jurisdiction in the first place. Advocate B.K. Singh reads the jurisdiction and arbitration clauses before he touches the invoices. They tell you where you can sue. Sometimes they tell you that you can't sue at all.

The rules that matter most in a Delhi commercial suit

Section 12A mediation in Delhi

For most commercial suits in Delhi, you first apply for pre-institution mediation to the District Legal Services Authority of the district where the suit will be filed. These authorities work under the Delhi State Legal Services Authority, and if the suit is meant for the High Court, the application usually goes to the Delhi High Court Legal Services Committee instead. The authority sends notice to the other side. If it doesn't turn up, or refuses, you get a non-starter report and you're free to file.

If both sides take part, the mediation gets three months, extendable by two with consent, under the Commercial Courts (Pre-Institution Mediation and Settlement) Rules, 2018. Time spent in mediation doesn't count against limitation. Good to know. A settlement signed there has the status of an arbitral award, so you can execute it directly. Delhi courts have rejected plaints filed without mediation where the urgency was only a label. They've also held that a defendant who refused to take part can't later complain that mediation wasn't completed.

For plain unpaid dues, mediation in Delhi works better than most businesses expect. It gives the debtor a formal room in which to offer instalments without losing face. It's less useful when the defendant is just buying time, turning up to each session with a new excuse and no cheque, and in that case the three months should go into preparing a complete plaint. Our page on mediation at the legal services authority explains how the Delhi authorities run it.

How we run a commercial matter in Delhi, step by step

This is the usual order for a recovery or contract dispute. Urgent injunction matters skip mediation and go straight to court.

1. First meeting, and a hard look at the papers

   Send us the contract, orders, invoices, ledger and the emails. We look at limitation first, then the jurisdiction and arbitration clauses, the value and the right court. We'll talk fees at this meeting as well, and you'll get them in writing, stage by stage.

2. Legal notice

   The notice states what's owed, the interest and a date to pay, and it goes to every address and email we can find. Quite often that alone brings a cheque or an offer. Any reply helps us later. Even a rude one.

3. Section 12A mediation

   We apply to the correct Delhi authority and come to the sessions with you. If you settle, it's recorded, and you can enforce it.

4. Plaint and filing

   The plaint goes in with a statement of truth, all the documents, the Order XI declaration, a Section 63 certificate for anything electronic, and the court fee. The Delhi High Court takes filings electronically. District courts take them online or over the counter.

5. Interim applications, if you need them

   Assets disappearing, or your brand being copied? Then the injunction, attachment before judgment or receiver application is filed with the plaint, so the judge can deal with it on day one.

6. Defence, documents and case management

   Once the written statement is in, both sides admit or deny each other's documents. Then comes the case management hearing, where issues are framed. If the defence looks thin, we ask for summary judgment.

7. Trial, judgment and execution

   Evidence is by affidavit, followed by cross-examination. After the decree we move for execution fast, unless the other side has a stay from the appeal court.

Got a signed contract, an acknowledged invoice or a cheque? Then a summary suit can shorten all of this, since the defendant needs the court's leave even to put up a defence.

Time and costs for a commercial suit in Delhi

Papers a Delhi commercial suit needs

Filing in Delhi: e-filing, court fee and the paperwork

Commercial suits in the Delhi High Court are filed online through its e-filing portal, with scanned and bookmarked documents and a paginated index. The district courts in Delhi accept e-filing too, and you can still file physically at the counter in each complex. Either way, the court checks the court fee, signatures, the statement of truth, the Section 12A report, the documents and the vakalatnama, which in Delhi carries the advocates' welfare stamp. Our guide on e-filing a commercial suit in Delhi goes through the formats.

Court fee in Delhi is ad valorem on the amount claimed, under the Court Fees Act, 1870 as it applies in Delhi. For most plaintiffs it's the biggest cheque at filing, and it's paid as e-court fee. The schedule runs in slabs and has changed over the years. Check it. Our guide to court fee on a recovery suit in Delhi shows how it's worked out.

One thing slows Delhi cases down more than people realise: a plaint sent back for defects nobody needed to make. Missing pages. Unsigned affidavits. Documents with no index, or a valuation that doesn't match the prayer. Each round of registry objections can eat a week or more. We'd rather spend an extra day going over the file before it goes in.

Delhi's markets and industrial areas: how the disputes differ

Wholesale traders in Chandni Chowk, Sadar Bazar, Khari Baoli and Karol Bagh sell on credit, often on the back of relationships that go back years. The paperwork might be a parchi, a ledger entry and a handful of WhatsApp messages. That's often enough. But the plaint has to build the trail carefully, from GST invoices, e-way bills, ledger confirmations and the bank entries for past payments. The usual defence is that the goods came back or the account was settled in cash. So show the pattern of dealing over time.

Manufacturers in Okhla, Naraina, Mayapuri, Wazirpur, Bawana and Narela keep running into quality objections that surface for the first time after a legal notice. If the buyer took the goods and didn't reject them in writing within a reasonable time, that silence is strong evidence. Keep the goods receipt notes and any test reports. IT resellers and service companies in Nehru Place, Connaught Place and Aerocity have a different problem. Their fights are about scope and acceptance, and the sign-off mails and change requests usually decide them.

Landlords and tenants of shops and offices in Lajpat Nagar, Connaught Place and the commercial complexes deal with a mix of laws. A lease of premises used only for business is a commercial dispute, but premises covered by the Delhi Rent Control Act, 1958 go to that Act's own forum, and some older shop tenancies still fall under it. Which one applies turns on the rent, when the tenancy began and how the place is used. Get it wrong and you're in the wrong court.

Suppliers, service firms, lenders, startups, MSMEs and large companies

Suppliers and service firms mostly sue over unpaid bills. Their strength is paper. Where the buyer signed the contract or confirmed the balance, a summary suit is often the right call. Lenders who gave inter-corporate deposits or trade advances to another business can sue in the commercial court as well. A bank or financial institution recovering Rs 20 lakh or more, though, usually has to go to the Debts Recovery Tribunal instead. That's covered on drtadvocates.com.

Startups get sued about as often as they sue. A vendor files after payments slip, and the founders, busy running the company, let the 30 days slide. In Delhi, like everywhere else, the 120-day limit for the written statement is absolute. If you've been served, the defence needs attention that same week. Not next month.

Micro and small enterprises registered under the MSMED Act can claim interest at three times the RBI bank rate, and can choose between a suit and the Delhi MSE Facilitation Council. Large companies tend to face multi-party contract disputes and IP suits, where the fights are over interim injunctions, disclosure of documents and whether to file in the district courts or the High Court. With bigger clients who come to Advocate B.K. Singh, the first argument is often about which company in the group actually signed the contract.

Mistakes Delhi businesses make before a commercial suit

• Waiting too long. Most money claims have to be filed within three years under the Limitation Act, 1963. A written acknowledgment or a part payment restarts the clock. A phone call doesn't.
• Skipping mediation. File without Section 12A mediation, with no real urgency, and the plaint may well be rejected.
• Holding documents back. Commercial suits want every document with the plaint. Anything you produce later may be refused.
• Getting the value wrong. Forget the interest, or pile on damages nobody will award, and you could land in the wrong court or pay far more court fee than you needed to.
• Ignoring the arbitration clause. If there is one, the other side will ask the court to send the dispute to arbitration. Usually the court does.
• Letting the debtor empty the godown. If stock is being sold off or premises shut, ask for attachment before judgment along with the plaint, not later. See freezing assets before judgment.

Trademark, copyright and other IP suits in Delhi

IP suits are commercial disputes, and Delhi is one of the busiest places in India for them. Suits above Rs 2 crore go to the Delhi High Court, which has its own Intellectual Property Division. Smaller ones go to the District Judge (Commercial Court). Section 134 of the Trade Marks Act, 1999 lets a trademark owner sue where it carries on business. Useful for Delhi brand owners.

IP suits often need orders fast. An ex parte injunction, perhaps, or a local commissioner to seize fake goods from a godown in Gandhi Nagar or Sadar Bazar, or directions to online platforms to pull listings down. These suits usually fall within the urgent relief exception to Section 12A mediation, so you don't wait three months while the copies keep selling. Our page on trademark infringement and passing off has more.

Be careful with valuation in an IP suit. The plaintiff puts a value on the relief, and that value decides whether the suit goes to the district court or the High Court, and how much court fee you pay. Undervalue it to stay in the district court and the defendant can challenge that.

Appeals and execution in Delhi

Appeals from a Delhi district commercial court or from the Commercial Division go to the Delhi High Court's Commercial Appellate Division. Section 13 gives you 60 days. You can't appeal every interim order, only the ones listed in Order XLIII CPC, and Section 8 bars civil revisions against interim orders altogether. Beyond the High Court there's the Supreme Court, by special leave petition under Article 136, filed through an Advocate-on-Record and ordinarily within 90 days.

Filing an appeal doesn't freeze the decree. Only a stay does that, and a stay often comes with a condition to deposit. Without one, the decree holder can file for execution under Order XXI CPC in the court that passed the decree. We usually go for bank accounts and receivables first. It's quicker. The Supreme Court said in Rahul S. Shah v. Jinendra Kumar Gandhi (2021) that execution should ordinarily be decided within six months.

Assets in Noida, Gurugram or another city? The decree can be sent to the court there for execution. Our page on executing a decree covers attachment, arrest (rare), and the objections you'll face from the other side.

Talk to us about your Delhi commercial dispute

We're in Dwarka, New Delhi, a few minutes from the Dwarka courts, and the other Delhi complexes aren't a long drive. There's a second office in Vaishali, Ghaziabad. To set up a meeting, in person or on video, call or WhatsApp +91 96259 61599. Bring the papers listed above, sorted by date, and a page on what went wrong. We talk about fees at that first meeting and put them in writing, stage by stage. More on our process and fees page.

Before the week's out, find your limitation date. Locate the signed agreement and any written acknowledgment of the debt. Note the date any summons reached you. And if assets are moving or your brand is being copied, ring us that day. Urgent orders need urgent filing.

Want someone to go over your contract, invoices or court papers? Or a heads-up when Delhi's commercial court limits change? Get in touch with Advocate B.K. Singh's team through the contact page.