The National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) has admitted a petition filed by Venugopal Dhoot, the former Videocon group chairman and managing director, who had challenged a June 9 order of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT).

The tribunal in its order had approved a Rs 2,962-crore takeover bid for its 13 group companies by Anil Agarwal’s Twin Star Technologies.

The appellate tribunal has issued notices to the resolution professional, lenders and Twin Star Technologies directing them to file a reply by September 17.

“We have considered the submissions of various parties. We admit the appeal and the respondents are directed to file their reply by September 15, 2021 and, thereafter, the rejoinder, if any, be filed by September 17, 2021,” a PTI report quoting the NCLAT said.

The two-member bench comprising Justice J.K. Jain and A.K. Mishra has listed the matter for hearing on September 20.

In June, the Mumbai bench of the NCLT gave its nod for the Rs 2,962 crore takeover bid by Twin Star Technologies for the 13 companies of the Videocon group.

However, this order was stayed by the appellate tribunal on July 19 over the petitions filed by two dissatisfied creditors of the Videocon group — Bank of Maharashtra and IFCI Ltd — and had directed to maintain “status quo ante”.

This stay was extended further till September 20, the next date of hearing in the issue.

Dhoot, in his petition filed before the NCLAT, has requested to set aside the order passed by the Mumbai bench of the NCLT and to direct the lenders to consider a Rs 31,789- crore settlement plan submitted by him under section 12A of the Insolvency & Bankruptcy Code (IBC).

The NCLT Mumbai bench through its order on December 15, 2020 had said that the foreign oil and gas assets of the Videocon group, held through its foreign subsidiaries, were purchased by Videocon Industries Ltd (VIL) and were to be treated as assets of VIL, Dhoot said in his plea.

He claimed that the liquidation value of these oil assets was not less than Rs 15,000 crore. The bids for the oil and gas assets are yet to be decided and Dhoot wants them to be included in the resolution plan.

Dhoot in his petition said that the resolution professional (RP) or the committee of creditors (Coc) have no authority to sell the oil assets and consumer durables separately.

“If the RP had sold the oil and consumer durables together, the RP would have got a minimum Rs 25,000 crore against a loan of Rs 49,000 crore (Rs 29,000 crore of VIL consumer durables and Rs 20,000 crore of the oil assets). Thus recovery would have been around 50 per cent and not 5 per cent as seen today,’’ the plea said.