Ahmedabad: The Ahmedabad bench of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) on Friday approved AreclorMittal’s Rs 45,000 crore resolution plan for the insolvent Essar Steel. The Lakshmi Mittal-owned steel giant’s bid for Essar Steel was approved by the insolvent company’s committee of creditors in October 2017. NCLT said it cannot impose judicial view over banks’ wisdom. However, asking Committee of Creditors (CoC) to reconsider distribution of dues, NCLT suggested the lenders to give 15% of total offer to operational creditors. ArcelorMittal’s takeover bid was approved by the CoC in October 2018 and was pending before NCLT since then.
“The adjudicating authority can have only limited review of the resolution plan so as to ensure compliance of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code norms…We also cannot impose judicial view over commercial wisdom of the committee of creditors” a two-member bench of Harihar Prakash Chaturvedi and Manorama Kumari said. Today, the tribunal said that while it found the plan to be compliant with the norms of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, it had given suggestions with regard to the distribution of funds accruing out of the sale.
JSW-Bhushan Steel
In another case, the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) has directed the Delhi bench of the NCLT to decide over JSW Steel’s bid for the debt-ridden Bhushan Power & Steel by March 31. A two-member NCLAT bench headed by Justice S J Mukhopadhaya has also directed the NCLT to hear the representatives of operational creditors, promoters along with dissenting banks. “We expect NCLT to decide the case at an early date to ensure that the matter is decided before the end of this financial year,” the appellate tribunal said.
