Delhi HC asks Malvinder Singh to deposit 3.5 million Singapore dollars

The Delhi High Court today asked former Ranbaxy promoter Malvinder Singh to deposit 3.5 million Singapore dollars with it.

Malvinder received the said amount from the sale of 45 lakh of his shares in Singapore stock-exchange listed Religare Health Trust in April 2018.

This sale, Justice Rajiv Shakder noted, was “undoubtedly” in “disobedience” of a February 19, 2018 order of the Court directing Malvidner and younger brother Shivinder Singh to not sell or mortgage any of their assets.

“Undoubtedly there had been disobedience of the directions of the Court. Therefore, for the moment Respondent 1 is directed to deposit the money received by him upon the sale of these shares with the registry of this court…within four weeks.”, Justice Shakdher stated.

The Court further directed Malvinder to file all documents concerning the sale of the said shares.

The Court also released a sum of approximately Rs. 9 crores in Daiichi Sankyo’s favour. This amount was realized from the sale of unencumbered listed shares owned by the two brothers, pursuant to the Court’s order passed earlier this year. The said amount was then deposited with the Court’s registry.

The Court, however, asked Daiichi to file an affidavit stating that it would re-deposit the said amount with the Court, with interest, in case an order to that effect is passed in the future.

Justice Shakdher was hearing Daiichi Sankyo’s plea to recover a Rs 3,500 crore award passed by an arbitral tribunal in its favour. On January 31 this year, Justice Jayant Nath of the Delhi high court had upheld the enforceability of this award.

The tribunal had found the Singh brothers and others guilty of several counts of misconduct when Daiichi bought their 34.82% stake for $2.4 billion in 2008. The Singh brothers and twelve others were found to have made false claims in a self-assessment report, along with misrepresenting the genesis, nature, and severity of the US regulatory investigations into Ranbaxy.

The proceedings, for the first time, also witnessed the two brothers being represented by different counsels. While Senior Advocate Akhil Sibal appeared for Malvinder, Senior Advocate Sandeep Sethi appeared for Shivinder.

Shivinder has broken his silence on the downfall of the family’s Fortis empire debacle, claiming that “the collective, ongoing actions of Malvinder and Sunil Godhwani (ex-Religare MD) led to a systematic undermining of the interests of the companies and their shareholders”.

Shivinder has filed a suit against Malvinder and Godhwani for an oppression and mismanagement of RHC Holding, Religare and Fortis before National Company Law Tribunal, Principal Bench which would hear the matter on September 6.

Daiichi Sankyo was represented by Senior Advocates Arvind Nigam and Arun Kathpalia.

The matter will be heard next on October 11.