The Supreme Court’s verdict upholding the decision of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) and its appellate body (NCLAT) to order the liquidation of Devas Multimedia will create a new situation where domestic law will be pitted against international arbitration awards. A two-judge bench comprising justices V Ramasubramanian and Hemant Gupta, came to a strong conclusion against Devas. “We find all the grounds of attack to the concurrent orders of the NCLT and NCLAT to be unsustainable. Therefore, the appeals by Devas Multimedia are dismissed.” The verdict upheld the claim that there was “fraud” involved.
There is little doubt that the verdict will strengthen the hands of ISRO’s subsidiary Antrix, which entered into a deal with Devas Multimedia in 2005 to launch two satellites and make available 70 Mhz of S-band spectrum for commercial use. The deal was cancelled in 2011 after allegations of fraud and non-compliance with the law were alleged, and in 2015 the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed cases against Devas and those involved.
In October 2020, however, Antrix lost an international arbitration award filed under the International Chamber of Commerce’s rules. Since then, investors in Devas have been moving courts in Canada and France seeking the takeover of assets belonging to the Indian government even though it is Antrix that is the other party (read more about the details of the dispute here).
While it is doubtful whether international courts…
