NCLT Appoints Deloitte’s Aneesh Nanavati As RP For Reliance Communications

The bankruptcy tribunal Friday approved the appointment of Aneesh Nanavati of Deloitte as the resolution professional for Reliance Communications and its two subsidiaries–Reliance Telecom and Reliance Infratel.

According to RCom’s own admission, financial creditors have made claims worth Rs 57,382 crore from RCom and its two subsidiaries as of June 16.

Of this over Rs 7,000 crore are from group companies themselves and over Rs 47,000 crore are from 53 banks including Rs 14,775 crore from Chinese lenders.

The committee of creditors informed the tribunal that all the three companies have unanimously chose Nanavati as the RP as the nature of business of all the three entities are inter-connected.

The tribunal directed the RP to file progress report of the resolution plan by July 23 when it will hear the case.

Meanwhile, the tribunal kept the next date of hearing on the Doha Bank plea on July 28.

Doha Bank had on May 30 moved NCLT seeking a stay on the lenders’ decision on Reliance Infratel on claims. The bank had lent Rs 1,400 crore to the company. The foreign bank said the domestic lenders’ decision will marginalise its voting rights to 15 percent from around 55 percent currently.

On May 15, the Mumbai NCLT had admitted an insolvency petition filed by Ericsson against RCom and RITL and Reliance Telecom, seeking to recover unpaid dues worth hundreds of crores.

In an exchange filing on June 17, RCom said three Chinese banks — China Development Bank, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China and Exim Bank of China– have made claims worth Rs 14,775 crore from it. Of this Rs 9,863.89 crore is from China Development Bank, making it the biggest creditor to the debt-laden telecom company.

As per the exchange filing, Exim Bank of China had lent Rs 3,356.44 crore to the company and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China had given Rs 1,554 crore.

The company had also given the list of its 56 financial creditors to the exchanges on that which have made claims worth Rs 57,382.50 crore under bankruptcy proceedings.

Among the domestic lenders, State Bank is the biggest creditor with Rs 4,905.37 crore, followed by LIC (Rs 4,758 crore) and Bank of Baroda (2,707.67 crore), Standard Chartered Bank (Rs 2,130.23 crore), Syndicate Bank (Rs 1,225.19 crore), and PNB (Rs 1,126.87 crore).

RCom itself sought bankruptcy early February after its efforts to sell spectrum to Reliance Jio failed due to regulatory delays. The telco had in 2018 entered into an agreement with Reliance Industries to sell its spectrum for Rs 25,000 crore.

RCom also informed exchanges that sister concerns also made claims worth Rs 7,000.63 crore against it. These companies include Reliance HR Services seeking Rs 3,368.95 crore, Reliance Capital (Rs 1,291.71 crore) and Reliance Communications Enterprise (Rs 2,336.22 crore)and the Bermuda- based Reliance Globalcom seeking to recover Rs 3.75 crore.

But the interim RP did not admit any of these claims instead marked the entire amount for verification.—Business Standard