The firm Arbitration (a form of ADR) Act was passedin 1698 under William III. This was an Act for rendering the award of arbitrators more effectual in all cases for the final determination of controversies referred to them by merchants and traders, or others. In 1854, Common Law Procedure Art expressly empowered courts to remit an award for reconsideration by the arbitrators. It aim empowered courts to stay (stop) an action in court if the parties had agreed m take the dispute to arbitration. Effectively, the Arbitration Act 1440 gifted a number of modem steps to be taken to agree disputes between the parties: the parties appoint arbitrators court may also appoint arbitrators if the parties fail to do so; decide the disputes informally, make an award, or settle the dispute by mediation, compromise or any other mama; court pass a decree in tams of the award d found the decision was made properly, and Arbitration Tribunal shall be competent m appoint expert or legal advisor to submit report to at an specified question or assessor for assisting it on technical matters.

Later in Arbitration Act 1950, there was a consolidation of the Arbitration Aces 1889 and 1934. It included the power of a court to stay actions where there was an applicable arbitration agreement. In addition the Arbitration An 1975 gave effect to the New York Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards.

In 1976 Professor frank Sander said in his book Varieties of Dispute Processing’, in future, not simply a courthouse but a dispute resolution centre or a multi-door courthouse where disputants would be screened and channeled m a variety of dispute resolution processes such an mediation, arbitration, fact-finding malpractice screening panel, superior court, or an ombudsman.

In 1976 in Bangladesh, Gram Adalat law was passed under the auspices of Union Parishad to settle minor criminal and civil law suits. The law house    bestowed an UP Chairman or Gram Adalat Chairman with power of a third claw magistrate. The court is comprised of 5 members including the Chairman, 2 General members and 2 members selected by the complainant and defender. The judgment of the court will be validated with unanimous support or by majority of 4:1. No one cam, raise any question regarding the legality o[ the verdict.

The Arbitration Act 1979 dealt principally with regulating the courts’ powers to review arbitration awards and to determine any question of law arising in the course of arbitration.

In 1980, the then Government of Bangladesh had passed a bill for introducing the office of an ombudsman to meet a constitutional binding; following the same last year, the Government has adopted a policy of introducing ombudsman sector-wise and has already set up a Tax Ombudsman.

In 1981, considering expenses and delays in disposal of cases through the legal system of India. a judgment was made by the Supreme Court of India in the case ‘Guru Nanak Foundation vs.  We Rattan Singh & Sons, AIR 1481 SC 2075′ saying, Interminable, time-consuming, complex and expensive court procedures impelled jurists to search for an alternative forum, leas formal, more effective and seedy for resolution of disputes avoiding procedural claptrap and this led them to …’

In 1982, Richard Abel summarizes the political ambiguity that imbues the history of ADR in The Politics of Informal Justice’: Yet if the goals of informal justice arc contradictory, and if it is incapable of realizing them because of contradictions inherent in advanced capitalism, in formalism should not simplistically be repudiated as merely an evil to be resisted, or be dismissed as a marginal phenomenon that can safely be ignored. It is advocated by reformers and embraced by disputants precisely because it expresses values that deservedly elicit broad allegiance: the preference for harmony over conflict, for mechanisms that offer equal access to the many rather than unequal privilege to the few, that operate quickly and cheaply, that permit all citizens to participate in decision making rather than limiting authority to “Professionals; that are familiar rather than esoteric, and that strive for and achieve substantive justice rather than frustrating it in the name of form.