Kolkata: The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) Cuttack bench has cancelled the resolution plan of UK headquartered Liberty House Group (LHG) for Adhunik Metaliks Ltd. (AML) and ordered for liquidation of the bankrupt Odisha company.
The Sanjeev Gupta owned LHG had sucessfully bid for the AML assets for Rs 410 crore putting behind the the only other bidder Maharashtra Seamless Steels of DP Jindal Groups.
However, the LHG failed to make the upfront cash payment of Rs 410 crore even within the timeline to acquire the steel company.
On a petition filed by counsel Joy Saha on behalf of the bankers committee of creditors (CoC) justice B Gosavi of NCLT Cuttack bench cancelled the resolution plan of LHG. Justice Gosavi also ordered for liquidation of the AML assets while rejecting the appeal of the CoC to allow the to consider the resolution plan submitted by Maharashtra Seamless.
The bench has appointed the former resolution professional (RP) Sumit Binani as the liquidator . Since there are still over 15,00 employees workers at the steel company, the bench directed the liquidator to liquidate/sale the company as a going concern as per Regulation 32(f) of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India( Liquidation Process Regulation, 2016).
Adhunik Metaliks has a steel making unit in Odisha’s Sundergarh district.
The NCLT Kolkata bench has, in fact, in July 2018 had approved the resolution plan of LHG, with lenders agreeing to take a haircut of around 92% and settling for Rs 410 crore against their outstanding of Rs 5370 crore.
The lenders to AML are SBI, PNB, ICICI Bank, UCO Bank, Allahabad Bank, Bank of Boroda, Corporation Bank, Punjab & Sindh Bank, IFCI and SERI Infra Finanace among others.
