The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has placed on hold an order approving a repayment plan worth Rs 6.25 crore from Zee Group founder Subhash Chandra in his personal insolvency case.
A five-member bench of the NCLT Wednesday gave a stay to the order passed by its August 25 sitting that allowed an Rs 6.25-crore repayment proposal by Chandra. It also restrained the promoter from transferring his assets, directly or indirectly.
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Notices have been issued to the concerned parties and the case will be taken up again after the NCLT finds that there was no majority view in the earlier proceedings. The NCLT had days ago approved Chandra's repayment plan on August 25.
The issue first arose when a two-member bench failed to arrive at a majority view on the repayment plan proposed by Chandra, who has made himself personally liable to pay back Rs 22,006.57 crore to lenders. One member had approved the distribution formula while the other had opposed it on various grounds.
The divergent views were then referred to a third member. On August 25, the third member approved the said formula and held that it would be binding on all creditors, including dissenting creditors. A few secured claims worth hundreds of crores were ruled to be outside the scope of the resolution process. However, on the next hearing, the two-member bench felt that the three views were not enough to constitute a majority view.
The matter was then referred to the President of NCLT who constituted the five-member bench, which will consider whether the view expressed by the three members qualifies as a majority view. The insolvency proceedings against Chandra were initiated by Indiabulls Housing Finance under Section 95 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code.
Chandra has contested the claim of Rs 22,006.57 crore being due from him as personal liability, saying that it pertained to loans raised by firms under the Essel Group, for which he had given personal guarantees. The latest order by the special bench does not reject the repayment proposal. The five-member bench will consider the case while the August 25 order stands stayed.
