The committee of creditors to Essar SteelNSE 0.00 %, led by the State Bank of India, has filed an application at the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) seeking the disposal of the insolvency case within the next three weeks, said a person with direct knowledge of the matter.
“The committee has appealed to the NCLAT so that it directs NCLT’s Ahmedabad chapter to approve the resolution plan,” the person said, on the condition of anonymity. NCLAT will hear the matter on Thursday.
The case has been running for about 500 days, while the maximum stipulated time for the resolution of any case under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code is 270 days.
An email sent to SBI remained unanswered until the publication of this report.
On October 25, more than 92 per cent of the creditors at Essar Steel voted in favour of a proposal by ArcelorMittal, which would be the new owner of the debt-laden steelmaker that had failed to repay thousands of crores to its creditors.
ArcelorMittal’s resolution plan entails an upfront payment of Rs 42,000 crore to lenders and an additional Rs 8,000 crore toward capital expenditure.
Separately, a group of operational creditors and Essar Steel shareholders have challenged the CoC and the resolution professional’s decision to accept the ArcelorMittal resolution plan. About 30 vendors, who had supplied goods and services to Essar Steel, came together to petition the NCLT’s Ahmedabad chapter, seeking their dues.
In November, Standard Chartered Bank, the third-largest secured financial creditor of Essar Steel, filed an application before the bankruptcy court alleging that the resolution professional and the CoC approved a resolution plan that, it alleged, did not comply with the IBC.
Source: Economic Times