Algo Legal v. Sequoia: Bengaluru court adjourns case to June 29

A Bengaluru court on Saturday adjourned the hearing in the ₹1 crore defamation suit filed by law firm Algo Legal and its founder Sandeep Kapoor against Sequoia Capital and several news publications..City Civil and Sessions Judge MH Annayyaanavar was told that Sequoia, HT Media Limited (owner of Hindustan Times) and E Eighteen.com Limited (Money Control) had filed their objections to the suit. Counsel for Twitter sought more time to file a reply.The Court directed issuance of summons to two journalists of Economic Times through email.Counsel for Algo Legal requested the Court to give an early date of hearing, claiming that Sequoia's objections indicate that the investigation into the conduct of the law firm and Kapoor has been ongoing for more than 6-7 months with no final finding and may take a long time to conclude, meanwhile media houses have been continuing to publish articles on the issue.Algo Counsel also informed the court that there are allegations, including in the objections, of unaccounted payments received by Algo from entities like Zilingo, but the Founder of Zilingo has herself clarified publicly that all payments made were for services rendered and kosher. Therefore, the very basis of the allegations are circumspect and so the court must not delay hearing these matters..The matter will now be heard on June 29..On the last date of hearing, the Court issued notice to Sequoia Capital, Twitter and a number of media outlets including Hindustan Times and Times of India. It, however, did not grant interim relief to Algo Legal and Kapoor..The suit arose after the media companies had published news articles reporting that Sequoia Capital had cut ties with Algo Legal after Kapoor apparently threatened some of its portfolio companies.In the defamation suit, Algo Legal and its founder Sandeep Kapoor have claimed that the publication of false news items resulted in the exit of three partners and several lawyers of the firm.Claiming that the news articles were maliciously motivated, laced with canards and entailed deliberate misrepresentation of facts, Kapoor stated in the plaint that he has been ridiculed and jeered in social circles as a result, and that the good opinion that people have of him has been diminished.Owing to the fiasco, Algo Legal's standing in the market has also been directly impacted, the plaintiffs have stated..Algo Legal is a law firm founded by Sequoia Capital's former general counsel Sandeep Kapoor, who as per his LinkedIn profile, worked at Sequoia for almost nine years till 2019.As per an email, Sequoia informed companies that “concerning incidents” involving the law firm Algo Legal were found in a recent investigation.Kapoor allegedly threatened some of the Sequoia portfolio companies with cases for violations of the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) and investigations by the Income Tax Department, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and other government agencies.It was further alleged that Kapoor, while taking advantage of his earlier position as Director Legal of Sequoia, was arm-twisting these portfolio companies to make them hire his firm (Algo Legal) or related entities for all legal work.