[Satyajit Bose is a 3rd Year student at the National Law School of India University, Bangalore] On 27 November 2019, the Supreme Court of India delivered its judgement in Hindustan Construction Co. Ltd. v. Union of India. In this case, a division bench of the Supreme Court was called upon to adjudicate on the constitutionality of section 87 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996 [‘1996...
CIRP against Government Companies: Has Supreme Court Settled the Debate?
[Soumyajit Saha is a 3rd year B.A. LL.B student at National University of Study and Research in Law, Ranchi] Last year, in Harsh Pinge v. Hindustan Antibiotics Limited, the judicial member of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT), Mumbai Bench dismissed the petition filed under section 9 of Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 (IBC). This was on the ground that corporate debtor, being a...
Reciprocity Requirements in India’s Adoption of the UNCITRAL Model Law on Cross Border Insolvency
[Soham Chakraborty is a II year, BA LLB (Hons.) student at NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad] The corporate insolvency resolution process (CIRP) of Jet Airways was one of the first instances of cross border insolvency in India. In the case, the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLAT) enabled a Dutch Court Administrator appointed by the Noord District Court in Holland to participate in the...
Can a Sole Proprietorship Initiate Insolvency Proceedings under the IBC?
[Sahithi Uppalapati is a III Year, B.A.LLB (Hons.) student at NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad] The recent decisions of various benches of the National Company Law Tribunal conflict on the issue of whether a sole proprietorship concern is covered under the term ‘person’ under section 3(23) of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016, which is determinative of who is entitled to initiate a...
Shareholder Ratification for Directors’ Breach of Duty
[Rajat Maloo is a III year B.A., LL.B. (Hons.) student at the National Law School of India University, Bangalore] Common law provides that those to whom duties are owed may release those who owe the duties from their legal obligations. In the corporate law context, this principle has been applied by courts in cases where shareholders ratified directors’ breaches of duties. However, various...
‘Apply and Explain’ – An Alternative Model of Corporate Governance
[Manasvin Andra is a III year student at NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad] Corporate governance has emerged as one of India Inc.’s primary concerns since the time the Satyam scandal came to light. The incident – dubbed “India’s Enron” – has had a seismic effect on how businesses are regulated, and its effects have been felt most prominently in terms of how corporate governance norms are...
Insolvency of Financial Service Providers and Third Party Rights Under Securitisation Contracts
[Richa Saraf is an Advocate] The Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 (“Code”) does not, in general, deal with insolvency of financial service providers (“FSPs”), as FSPs are seen to be systemic and complex structures engaging in unique transactions. However, the collapse of Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Limited (“DHFL”) led to the notification of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy (Insolvency and...
SEBI Introduces Greater Transparency in the AIF Space
[Vaneesa Agrawal is the founder and Rishi Ahuja an associate at Thinking Legal] The Securities and Exchange Board of India (“SEBI”) has, through a Circular dated February 5, 2020 (“Circular”), issued disclosure standards for the growing Alternative Investment Funds (“AIFs”) space. The Circular was preceded by a Consultation Paper dated December 4, 2019. SEBI has introduced performance...
SEBI’s Stewardship Code for Institutional Investors
[Pammy Jaiswal is a Partner at Vinod Kothari and Company] The activism of institutional investors was experienced for the very first time in Life Insurance Corporation v. Escorts Ltd., 1986 AIR 1370. While the Bombay High Court initially held that the role of the Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) is unconstitutional and mala fide, the Supreme Court allowed the LIC’s appeal and specifically stated...
MCA’s Proposals for Overhauling the Audit Industry
In corporate governance parlance, auditors are considered to be key “gatekeepers”. However, governance failures both in India and around the world have pointed fingers towards the role of auditors. This has led to a series of reforms that impose greater stringency on auditors and the audit process. For example, the audit provisions in the Companies Act, 2013 (the “Act”) have been designed...
Delhi High Court Allows E-commerce Platforms to Sell Products of Direct Selling Entities
[Kajal Kashyap is a 4th year B.A. LL.B. (Hons) student at NALSAR University of Law] In Amazon Sellers Services Pvt. Ltd. v. Amway India Enterprises Pvt. Ltd., a division bench of the Delhi High Court overruled an earlier judgment passed in 2019 by a single judge of the same court, thereby allowing e-commerce platforms like Amazon and Flipkart to sell products of Amway and other direct selling...
India’s Approach to Liability of Hotels for Loss of Guest Property
[Pareekshit Bishnoi is an advocate based in Delhi] What are the legal consequences when a person visits a hotel and gives their car for valet parking, which is later reported as lost or damaged? In such cases of loss or damage from infra hospitium (meaning “within the hotel”), a question often arises as to the nature of liability of such hotel-owner or innkeeper. To determine the nature of...
The Expanding Scope of Commercial Wisdom in the IBC: Numbing all Checks and Balances?
[Kartikey Sanjeev Bhalotia and Arshit Kapoor are 2nd year students at the National Law University Odisha] While overruling a decision of the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT), the Supreme Court in Maharashtra Seamless Limited v. Padmanabhan Venkatesh (decided on 22 January 2020) accepted the decision of the committee of creditors (CoC) approving the appellant’s resolution plan which...
Retrospective Termination of Sole Arbitrator: A Move Uncalled For?
[Prince Todi is a III year B.A. LL.B. (Hons.) student at Hidayatullah National Law University, Raipur, Chattisgarh] On 20 January 2020, the Delhi High Court in Prodattur Cable TV Digi Services v. Siti Cable Network Limited held that the unilateral appointment of a sole arbitrator by an authority interested in the outcome of the dispute is impermissible. While the same principle has been laid down...
SEBI Portfolio Management Regulations, 2020: Towards an Investor Friendly Regime
[Anukrati Mishra is a final year B.A. LLB (Business Law Hons) student at Institute of Law, Nirma University, Ahmedabad] On 16 January 2020, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) undertook the first overhaul of the regulations governing portfolio management services (PMS) in over two decades by issuing the SEBI (Portfolio Managers) Regulations, 2020. The new regulations have been...
Takeover of Unlisted Companies: A New Route
Squeeze out of minority shareholders of companies has been a controversial area. As a co-author and I had discussed, there are a number of methods by which squeeze outs can be effected in Indian companies. By way of a recent set of notification and rule-making efforts, the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) has just added another method that would be applicable to unlisted companies. Among the...
Budget 2020: What’s there for the Real Estate Sector?
[Akash Kumar Prasad is a fourth-year student at NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad] The Union Budget 2020-21 was presented on February 1, 2020 by the Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. Amidst sharp decline in the economy, the Union Budget was awaited with great expectations to foster growth in the real estate sector. However, with no major announcement for catalysing the same, the Budget fell...
India’s Insider Trading Regime: How Connected Are You?
[Prateek Bhattacharya is an Assistant Professor and Assistant Dean (Scholarships), Jindal Global Law School, O.P. Jindal Global University.] ‘Insider trading’ refers to the illegal buying or selling of a security in breach of a fiduciary duty or other relationship of trust. Such sale of a share or security is carried out on the basis of material non-public information (the term used in the United...
Whether a Section 11 Application can be Dismissed on the Grounds of Limitation?
[Piyush Rathi is a 4th Year B.A. L.L.B student at NALSAR University of Law] The Supreme Court in Uttarakhand Purv Sainik Kalyan Nigam Limited v Northern Coal Field Limited (27 November 2019) obtained a chance to expand on the jurisprudence relating to the approach of ‘minimal intervention of courts in arbitral process‘ taken by the legislature. The issue faced by the Supreme Court was...
A Book from the Blog: “The Reform Decade: Corporate and Commercial Law in India”
It has been nearly two years in the making, but a book to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the IndiaCorpLaw Blog is now out. Published by the Eastern Book Company, it is titled “The Reform Decade: Corporate and Commercial Law in India”. In this volume, we have curated and edited several blog posts in the form of articles, which we divide thematically into 11 parts. These are: Company Law...
The Gig Is Up – Redefining Employment for Platform Workers
[Shreya Bhatnagar and Aatman Shukla are students of B.A. LL.B. (Hons.) at National Law University Delhi] Today, one of the greatest drivers of the ‘on-demand employment’ economy has been the rise of platform-based apps such as UberWorks or Urban Company, which have replaced traditional paper-applications and references for seeking employment. Such platform-based apps have eliminated the...
Safeguarding Promoters’ Interest in Insolvent Companies: Recent Judgments of the NCLAT
[Soham Chakraborty is a II year, BA LLB (Hons.) student at NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad] A series of judgments of the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (“NCLAT”), as discussed herein, have led to some important developments regarding the rights of promoters when it comes to regaining control of their company under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 (“the Code”). These judgments...
NCLAT’s Ruling on Exclusion of Lease and Rental Operational Debt
[Chetan Saxena is a 4th-year student from the Institute of Law, Nirma University, Ahmedabad] The National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) in Ravindranath Reddy v. G. Kishan (17 January 2020) held that rental dues arising out of a lease agreement do not fall under the definition of “operational debt” under section 5(21) of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 (IBC). The determination of...
SEBI Guidelines for Rights Issue of REIT Units
[Rongeet Poddar is a 5th year student at the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences] Real Estate Investment Trusts (REIT) can be defined as entities that own properties in the real estate sector and finance their development. Structurally, a REIT is identical to an ordinary trust. The real estate properties are owned by the REIT. Companies or limited liability partnerships (LLPs)...
SEBI’s Deferral of the Chair-CEO Separation
Following the Kotak Committee recommendations, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) in May 2018 announced that the top 500 Indian listed companies must mandatorily separate the roles of the chair and CEO (or managing director) to prevent a concentration of power in a company’s leadership structure. Moreover, SEBI stipulated that the chairperson should not be related to the CEO. These...
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