Maldives Civil Court has ordered local submarine operator; Whale Submarine to repay USD 500,000 (MVR 7.7 million) for its failure to deliver a submarine vessel for the 2019 Jeddah World Fest, Saudi Arabia.
The company entered into agreement with UAE based Aventus Group, to deliver and operate the vessel for the festival. However, Whale Submarine fell short of their contractual obligations, and failed to deliver the vessel for the agreed date.
Aventus Group filed a lawsuit against Whale Submarine, claiming their advance payment of USD 500,000 along with USD 654,000 for site survey expenses, interests and legal fees.
Whale Submarine in their defense argued not receiving a transport to deliver the vessel for the contractually agreed date, adding the it had informed the company of the possibility of delay beforehand.
Whale Submarine said the advance would be repaid after deducting the costs incurred during the project period when submarine operations were suspended.
Civil Court on Sunday, October 30 held that neither parties were found culpable of negligence, and Whale Submarine's attempts on seeking a shipper falling short did not constitute to their negligence. The court held Whale Submarine was subjected to repay the advance amount of USD 500,000 to Aventus Group.
The judgment stated that it was not known whether Aventus Group had accepted Whale Submarine's offer to deduct money from the advance for the period during which operations had been suspended, and therefore, the amount should be paid in lump sum.
Moreover, Civil Court denied charging Whale Submarine to repay expenses incurred for site survey, interest and legal fees which Aventus Group had originally demanded.
Whale Submarine was ordered to settle the advance amount with Civil Court within a period of two months.
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