Month: February 2015
-
The Bombay High Court on Implied Exclusion
[Posted by V. Niranjan] The Bombay High Court has recently given an important judgment in Harkirat Singh v Rabobank. It has revisited the law on the implied exclusion of Part I of the Indian Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996, which we have considered this on a number of occasions on this Blog. The point remains…
-
Constitutionality of the Amended Definition of “Non-Performing Asset” Upheld
[Posted by Umakanth Varottil] [The following post is contributed by Prachi Narayan of Vinod Kothari & Company. She can be contacted at prachi@vinodkothari.com.] The Supreme Court in its judgment dated January 28, 2015 in Keshavlal Khemchand & Sons Pvt Ltd & Ors v. Union of India disposed off seventy petitions challenging the validity of the…
-
Budget 2015: Some Preliminary Thoughts
[Posted by Umakanth Varottil] The Finance Minister today announced India’s Budget 2015-2016. The Budget documents, including his speech are available here. It is significant that this Budget comes during a period of upturn in the economy after a few preceding years of perceived gloom and doom, especially from the perspective of foreign investors. Other features…
-
RBI’s New Diktat: Lending to a Subsidiary
[Posted by Umakanth Varottil] [The following post is contributed by Nivedita Shankar, who is a Senior Associate at Vinod Kothari & Company. She can be contacted at nivedita@vinodkothari.com] The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on January 7, 2015[1] has modified the Master Circular on Wilful Defaulters (Master Circular) with a view to usher in greater…
-
Report on Bankruptcy Law Reforms
[Posted by Umakanth Varottil] The state of bankruptcy law in India continues to leave much to be desired, and adds to the difficulties in doing business in the country. Several previous efforts have been undertaken towards reforms, but they have either been introduced on a piecemeal basis or have not entirely been successful. With this…
-
Truth in lending: Regulatory Measures in India
[Posted by Umakanth Varottil] [The following guest post is contributed by Neha Somani of Vinod Kothari Consultants Pvt. Ltd. The author can be contacted at nehasomani@vinodkothari.com] Truth-in-lending laws, found in many countries world-over, ensure that lenders make a truthful disclosure of their rates of interest, and do not seek to attract borrowers with misleading rates…
-
The State of Shareholder Activism
[Posted by Umakanth Varottil] The latest issue of the Economist carries two pieces (here and here) arguing about the importance of shareholder activism as a means to enhance the management and governance of companies. The magazine appears to extol the virtues of activism in the current economic environment, although some might dispute whether activist investors…
-
The Liability of the Registrar of Companies for Negligent Entries
[Posted by V. Niranjan] It was widely reported last week that Companies House in the UK had been ordered to pay damages of £8.8 million for making a spelling mistake. The case, of course rather more complex than that, is Sebry v Companies House and raised an important question of law: is the Registrar of…