Kerala High Court junks writ petitions challenging NCLT order

Kerala High Court junks writ petitions challenging NCLT order

The Court held that the writ petitions were not maintainable under Article 226 of the Constitution of India

The High Court of Kerala dismissed a bunch of writ petitions challenging the order of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) at the Kochi Bench on the ground of maintainability under Article 226 of the Constitution of India.

A single-judge Court of Justice V.G. Arun in the High Court of Kerala dealt with all the writ petitions challenging the order of the NCLT, which is titled Ideal Surgicals v National Company Law Tribunal And Ors.

The facts of the matter are that the NCLT approved the Resolution Plan on 22 February 2021 and the Petitioners – Operational Creditors filed appeals before the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) against the said order. These present writ petitions were filed on the ground that the appeals and stay petitions are not being taken up by the NCLAT.

The Court while admitting the writ petition, had granted an interim stay of further proceedings of the order. The maintainability of these writ petitions was challenged on the ground that the Petitioners have an effective alternative remedy of appeal under Section 61 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 (IBC).

The Petitioners submitted that their appeals were accepted by the NCLAT, but are yet to be numbered and posted for admission. The Petitioners further contended that if the resolution process is continued in the meantime, in accordance with the order, the appeals would be rendered infructuous.

Various judgments of the Supreme Court of India were stated by the Court, with regards to the maintainability of the writ petition under Article 226 against an order of the NCLT.

Therefore, the single-judge Court, in view of the judgments of the Supreme Court regarding the objective of the Code, dismissed these writ petitions as being not maintainable under Article 226 of the Constitution.