New Delhi : The Delhi High Court dismissed Adani Power Ltd’s plea seeking to restrain Lanco Infratech Ltd from selling its shares in its 1200 mega watt thermal power plant in Udupi district of Karnataka, reports PTI.
Justice S Muralidhar asked the parties to initiate arbitration proceedings, as per the agreement between them, to settle their dispute with respect to Adani’s Rs 6,000 crore proposed acquisition of Lanco’s power plant.
Adani had moved the high court seeking to restrain Lanco and its representatives from selling its shares in Udupi Power Corporation Ltd or creating any third party interest in the unit, saying it would be a violation of a share purchase agreement (SPA) between them.
It wanted to restrain Lanco from selling shares of its Udupi unit till the time the arbitration proceedings remained pending, saying that otherwise its interests would be harmed as it had paid Rs 125 crore as advance consideration.
As per Adani’s plea, the conditions of the SPA required Lanco to provide consent to the transaction from all of its secured lenders as well as a consent to release the shares of Udupi pledged with them. It was Adani’s contention that of the 18 secured lenders, Lanco provided “purported consents” from only seven, despite which Adani gave its “purchaser undertaking” agreeing to re-pledge the released shares back with the lenders promptly after closing the deal. It had also obtained the requisite clearance from the Competition Commission of India, the petition said.
