Supreme Court junks UBHL plea against HC order to wind up Mallya's firm

New Delhi:The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a plea filed by liquor baron Vijay Mallya's United Breweries Holdings Limited (UBHL) to challenge a Karnataka High Court order to uphold the winding up of the company for recovery of dues payable by Kingfisher Airlines Ltd.

A bench headed by Justice UU Lalit declined to entertain the appeal filed by UBHL. The top court thus affirmed the winding up of the 102-year-old parent company of the UB Group.

Senior Advocate Mukul Rohatgi, representing the consortium of banks led by the SBI, informed the top court that so far around Rs 3,600 crore have been recovered but Rs 11,000 crore still needed to to be recovered from Mallya and UBHL.

Rohatgi contended that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) should not have attached the properties of the company as these were encumbered assets and thus banks had the first claim over the assets.

The total dues of UBHL to its creditors, as per the Karnataka High Court order in February 2018, are around Rs 7,000 crore.

On September 30, the United Breweries Holding Ltd had told the Supreme Court that it had offered over Rs 14,000 crore to various banks to settle its dues and that the company's assets exceeded its total debt.

Senior Advocate CS Vaidyanathan, appearing for United Breweries, had submitted before the top court that since the company's assets exceeded the total debt, it was not the case wherein the company should be directed to wind up.

Vaidyanathan insisted that the ED had attached many assets of the company, as a result of which none was available to the banks.