Banks have started to move against Future Retail Ltd (FRL) after talks between the Kishore Biyani-led group and Amazon failed. On Monday, Bank of India (BoI) issued a public notice in the newspapers on behalf of other lenders where it warned the public against dealing with the assets of FRL since it had the charge over them.

It also cautioned that any transactions could also be subject to clawbacks available under law “including for preferential transactions, undervalued transaction, fraud etc, in each case as understood under applicable laws’’.

Future Enterprises said in a stock exchange filing that Axis Finance had invoked the pledge on 4 lakh shares, which translates into a shareholding of 0.09 per cent of its equity, because of the “shortfall in security”.

Axis Finance on March 9 and March 10 invoked 195,000 shares and 154,000 shares amounting to 0.04 per cent and 0.03 per cent of its equity, respectively. In January this year, after FRL had missed the due date for payment of Rs 3,494.56 crore, banks had tagged the account as non-performing asset (NPA).

They were however, watching the outcome of the settlement talks before taking any steps to recover their exposure. The lenders have various options that include invoking the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) or the Reserve Bank of India’s June 7, 2019 circular to find a resolution.

Earlier, there were differences among lenders on the resolution route to be taken. Apart from BoI, some of the other major lenders of FRL include State Bank of India (SBI) and Bank of Baroda.

FRL owes around Rs 10,000 crore to banks, bond holders and other lenders.

Last month, the lenders had proposed to the Supreme Court that there be an open bidding for the assets of FRL between Amazon and Reliance.