INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
The Future group and Amazon stand-off has reached the doorstep of Supreme CourtNew Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday reserved verdict on a
batch of pleas filed by Future group firms against a Delhi High Court order declining stay on an arbitration tribunal decision refusing to
interfere with the Emergency Award (EA) of the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC)."We reserve the order
All the four SLPs (special leave petitions) are over
Anyway I will not write a lengthy judgment," a bench headed by Chief Justice N V Ramana said.Initially, the bench, also comprising justices
A S Bopanna and Hima Kohli, suggested the counsels for Amazon and the Future group firms that the single judge bench of the Delhi High Court
be allowed to hear the statutory appeals of the Future group against the final arbitral award of the SIAC.The bench said that the pleas,
which are arising from the EA's award and are pending before it, may not be "relevant now as the final award of the SIAC has already been
passed"."Your (Future group) first SLP which has challenged Justice J R Midha (Delhi HC) order, we had said that no implementation of that
reserved its order on two set of petitions filed by FCPL (Future Coupons Private Ltd ) and FRL (Future Retails Ltd).One set of appeals
challenged the March 18 order of the Delhi High Court which besides restraining FRL from going ahead with its deal with Reliance Retail, had
imposed costs of Rs 20 lakh on the Future Group and others associated with it and ordered attachment of their properties.The second set of
appeals have been filed against the Delhi High Court's recent order declining its plea for stay on an arbitration tribunal decision
refusing to interfere with the SIAC's EA, which restrained it from going ahead with the Rs 24,731 crore merger deal with Reliance
Retail.During the hearing on Tuesday, senior advocates Harish Salve and Mukul Rohatgi appeared for FRL and FCPL respectively and the US
e-commerce major, Amazon, was represented by senior lawyers Gopal Subramanium and Ranjit Kumar and others.Salve said for the merger deal to
go ahead the adverse orders passed last year on February 2 and March 18 have to be quashed.The US firm, which has invested in FCPL, has been
opposing the deal.The senior lawyer said the FRL will "sink with 30,000 employees losing their jobs" if the deal with RRL does not go
through.The FRL and FCPL said that they be allowed to go forward with the interlocutory proceedings of the scheme with Reliance to ensure
that they would be able to finalise the deal once the dispute with Amazon is concluded."We first sank because of a lockdown when people
We are in this financially precarious situation
Fortunately banks are willing to wait and say that if a transaction goes through Reliance deal will pay off the banks
The Reliance deal is close to Rs 26,000 crores, and Amazon's stake is Rs 14,000 crores
Around 30,000 jobs will be saved
If you put this all together, let us get to that final stage
Let that final stage does not go through
Amazon's interests are not hurt," Mr Salve said.He said even if eventually it was found by the courts that Reliance Industries Ltd arm
Court had stayed for four weeks all proceedings before the high court in relation to the implementation of the EA and also directed
statutory authorities like National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT), Competition Commission of India (CCI) and Securities and Exchange Board of
India (SEBI) not to pass any final order related to the merger deal in the meantime.The SIAC, in the EA, had granted relief to US e-commerce
major Amazon by restraining the Future from going ahead with the Rs 24,731 crore merger deal of Future Retail Ltd (FRL) with Reliance
Retail.Amazon had dragged Future Group to arbitration at SIAC in October last year, arguing that FRL had violated their contract by entering
into the deal with rival Reliance Retail.On October 21 last year, a duly-constituted panel of arbitrators at the SIAC reiterated the EA's
On October 29, 2021, the Delhi High Court declined Future Group's plea for stay on the arbitration tribunal
The high court sought response from Amazon which had challenged the merger before the SIAC, and listed the appeals by FCPL and FRL for
further hearing on January 4, 2022.Kishore Biyani and 15 others including FRL and FCPL have been embroiled in a series of litigations with
Amazon, an investor in FCPL, over the deal with Reliance
Following the EA, subsequently, a three-member arbitral tribunal was constituted to decide the issues arising from the deal.Subsequently,
the arbitration tribunal under the SIAC rejected on October 21, last year, the FRL plea to lift the interim stay granted by its EA on
October 25, 2020, observing that "the Award was correctly granted".The FRL and FCPL had moved the top court against the high court order of
August 17, 2021 which said that it would implement the earlier order by its single-judge restraining FRL from going ahead with the deal in
pursuance of the EA's award.On August 6, last year, the Supreme Court gave the verdict in favour of Amazon and held that EA award,
also set aside the two orders of February 8 and March 22, 2021 of the division bench of the Delhi High Court order which had lifted the
single-judge's orders staying the FRL-RRL merger.A bench headed by Justice R F Nariman, since retired, had dealt with the larger question
