Sentil Dayalan
senthil.dayalan@fortelaw.com
+65 6505 0211
Dispute resolution lawyer adept at handling a broad spectrum of complex commercial disputes.
Sentil was admitted as an Advocate & Solicitor of the Supreme Court of Singapore in 2011 and has gained extensive experience handling a wide range of commercial disputes straddling both international commercial arbitration and litigation. Senthil is equally at home in either forum having handled international arbitrations under the auspices of the SIAC, SCMA, LCIA and ICC as well as having appeared before all levels of the Singapore Courts including the Singapore International Commercial Court (SICC).
Senthil is comfortable handling all manner of commercial disputes with a particular focus in shipping, international trade and commodities, manufcaturing, energy, joint ventures and civil fraud matters. Senthil has also advised clients on restructuring and insolvency matters shareholder disputes, breaches of directors’ duties, employment disputes and sports law matters. Senthil is also regularly engaged in matters requiring urgent relief such as injunctions, freezing orders and search orders and has been appointed as supervising solicitor in relation to search orders on several occasions.
Between 2017 and 2021, Senthil was a legal service officer posted to the Ministry of Law (MinLaw) where he led various law reform projects touching on civil and criminal justice and commercial arbitration. In MinLaw, Senthil gained invaluable insight into policy making, balancing various stakeholder interests and on occasion participating in global legal forums. During his time at MinLaw, Senthil also had the privilege of staffing political office holders and senior management at MinLaw.
Senthil is actively involved as an Instructor with the Practice Training Advocacy Course and is a member of the Sports Committee of the Law Society of Singapore.
Senthil was educated at Raffles Institution and Raffles Junior College before reading law at the National University of Singapore. He was awarded the Sportsman of the Year for 2003 at Raffles Junior College and also represented Singapore in 2 sports – Cricket and Softball. With the latter, Senthil was privileged to be selected to be part of the contingent participating at the 2011 South-East Asian Games in Palembang, Indonesia where he earned a bronze medal.
Experience / Significant Cases
- Advising and representing the Govt of Sri Lanka in proceedings before the SICC arising out of the ‘X-press Pearl’ maritime incident off the coast of Sri Lanka.
- Advising and representing over 600 claimants in a representative action in the Singapore High Court arising from a foreign exchange investment scam.
- Acting for an Indonesian family-owned business in an ICC arbitration involving a dispute with a joint venture partner over crude palm oil production.
- Acting for a commodities trading house in an SIAC arbitration involving sleeving transactions and fraudulent trades of LME-certified metals.
- Advising and representing several investors who had been defrauded in the ‘Envy’ nickel trading scam.
- Advising and representing a middle-eastern bank in an SIACarbitration arising from the fraudulent ‘Hin Leong’ oil trades.
- Acting for a futures trader in a claim for wrongful dismissal against a financial institution.
- Acting for a director of a local subsidiary of an MNC in claims against his employer for wrongful dismissal – one of the first few cases in Singapore seeking recognition of the principles of implied term of mutual trust and confidence and stigma loss.
- Acting for corporates and individuals in enforcement of post-termination rights and obligations and restraint of trade clauses.
- Representing the Singapore Sepak Takraw Association (PERSES) in claims against the International and Asian governing bodies.
- Acting for a South Korean MNC in an SIAC arbitration involving claims against an Indonesian joint venture partner arising from the design and building of 2 thermal power plants.
- Acting for a Malaysian company in an SIAC arbitration involving claims of minority oppression and breaches of shareholders’ agreement.
- Acting for a prominent Hong Kong shipping family in claims brought by a liquidator against the family members in the Singapore High Court for breach of directors’ duties.