The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) on Wednesday (January 18) dismissed a contempt petition filed by two Cyrus Mistry family firms against Tata Sons and its directors. The two firms brought allegation of violation of NCLT directives to remove Mistry from the Tata Sons' board.
However, the bench has given Mistry family firms a liberty to file an affidavit within three days from the time Tata Sons holds an Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) on February 6, Press Trust of India (PTI) reported.
Also read: N Chandrasekaran appointed Chairman of Tata Sons
Pronouncing the judgment, a division bench of the NCLT said: "The contempt petition is dismissed."
The division bench was of the view that the action of Tata Sons cannot be amounted to contempt of court. In its petition, Cyrus Investments and Sterling Investment sought the NCLT's ruling barring Tata Sons from "convening or holding of the EGM scheduled for February 6, 2017, or any other date or from transacting any business thereat, PTI added.
The two Mistry family firms had filed the contempt plea saying that the conglomerate committee "a breach." Tata Sons on January 3 had given a special notice contesting the removal of Mistry as director of the board.
On its part, Abhishek Manu Singhvi (counsel for Tata Sons) said that both —Tata Sons and its directors — did not commit any contempt of NCLT by calling for an EGM contesting Mistry's removal. Further, he said the conglomerate was seeking Mistry's ouster as a director since he was acting in a manner which was damaging the company and its reputation.
Tata Sons had removed Mistry from the post of chairman of the $100 billion salt-to-software conglomerate last October. Since then, allegations have been flying both ways between Mistry and Ratan Tata.
