MUMBAI: An international arbitration court has ordered Tata Sons to pay $1.17 billion (nearly Rs 7,956 crore) to NTT DoCoMo for breach of contract on the grounds that the Indian group neither found a buyer nor bought back the Japanese partner’s 26% stake in their telecom joint venture Tata Teleservices.Two people familiar with matter said the Tata Group will now choose between challenging the arbitration award itself, or just question its enforceability, either of which will land the issue in an Indian court soon. One of these people said the company is expected to meet on Saturday with experts to charter a course of action.A third person said that NTT DoCoMo, on the other hand, plans to approach the Indian courts in case the Tata Group drags payment on the award, arguing that while the country’s rules prevented the group from paying earlier, this award is “more a penalty for breach of contract,” and thus not under the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) purview and therefore unencumbered. The Japanese company’s argument though will depend on the fine print of the award, said a lawyer specialising in the field.“If the award mentions a compensation for the equity value, DoCoMo's stance will be diluted, while if the award is just a penalty for breaching contract, DoCoMo has a stronger footing,” he added.NTT DoCoMo had moved the International Court for Arbitration in London in January last year after the Tata Group failed to find a buyer or buy back the 26% stake that DoCoMo held in Tata Teleservices at Rs 7,250 crore, or Rs 58.045 a share — half its original investment — as agreed in their JV contract. The Tatas couldn’t do so because of an RBI stipulation that no pre-agreement on price was acceptable for stake sales at a later date. The central bank instead said the price of any such sale must be at a market-determined rate, which in this case was Rs 23.34 a unit, less than half of what DoCoMo wanted.On Friday, NTT DoCoMo said that it had won an award in the arbitration. “The award orders that Tata Sons pay damages to DoCoMo in the amount of approximately $1,172 million for Tata Sons' breach of the shareholders agreement, upon DoCoMo's tender of its entire stake in TTSL to Tata Sons or its designee,” the Japanese company said in a release on Friday.A statement by Tata Sons said the group had received the order and were studying it. It declined to comment further but maintained its “position that Tata Sons has always been and continues to be committed to discharge its contractual obligations in a manner consistent with the law”.NTT DoCoMo conceded that uncertainties remained despite the award. “…some matters remain uncertain, including whether Tata Sons will pay the awarded damages and when the delivery of TTSL's shares will be made”. Further, it added that the impact from the judgment cannot be factored into the company’s quarterly results.The Tata group now could challenge the award in court, but that would mean accepting the award’s validity. Alternatively, the Indian company could try to question its enforcement by suggesting that since the RBI didn’t recognise the contract, it couldn’t be breached.The Tata Group declined to comment on specific queries on their plans forward. NTT DoCoMo didn’t respond to specific queries on its future moves.ET had reported in its May 17 edition that arguments on the arbitration had ended and a typical award comes within two months of that.NTT DoCoMo bought equity in Tata Teleservices in 2008 for $2.7 billion. The agreement had a clause that after three years, the Japanese company could exit, selling its stake in a public listing or a sale back to Tata Group. The sale price was safeguarded at half of its original investment.