New Dehi: Pointing out that Monday’s interim order of the Supreme Court staying insolvency proceedings against Jaypee Infratech has resulted in Jaypee getting back the company. IDBI, which had initiated the insolvency proceedings for default in the payment of Rs 526 crores, sought lifting of the stay.
Senior counsel Abhishek Singhvi appearing for IDBI made a mention before a three-judge bench of chief justices Dipak Misra and justices Amitav Roy and D.Y. Chandrachud about the filing of an application by IDBI and the bench agreed to hear the matter on September 11.
The bank submitted that staying the order of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) in Allahabad had reversed the position and, as a consequence, the company had gone back to being defaulting promoters.
Mr Singhvi told the court that the Jaypee group was in charge of the company again because of the apex court’s order on Monday. He said that IDBI Bank, which has a debt of Rs 4,000 crore out of a total consortium debt of Rs 10,000 crore, equally represents public money and is acting under the RBI guidelines as custodian of public monies.
A blanket SC stay had the wholly unintended effect of restoring the company into the hands of JP. The insolvency professional is much better equipped to deal with claims and counter-claims of homeowners rather than throwing back the letter into the hands of JP, who is the principal perpetrator of homeowners’ distress and borrower of Rs 10,000 crore of public monies.
Senior advocate Ajit Sinha, appearing for one of the home buyers, vehemently opposed the contention of the bank and said that home buyers were happy because of the court’s order which need not be changed.
On Monday, counsel informed the bench that being unsecured creditors, the buyers will get nothing out of the insolvency proceedings as the dues of financial institutions, which are secured creditors, would be cleared first. They wanted protection of the interests of over 30,000 buyers who invested their hard-earned money to book homes in 27 different projects of debt-ridden realty firm, Jaypee Infratech.
