The Future plea sought to restrain Amazon from interfering in the Reliance Retail-Future deal on the basis of an interim order passed by the Singapore International Arbitration Centre
The Delhi High Court on Monday declined to grant Kishore Biyani led Future Retail Ltd's (FRL) plea for an interim injunction restraining Amazon from writing to SEBI, CCI and other authorities about the arbitral order against its asset sale.
Justice Mukta Gupta passed the order on FRL's plea claiming that Amazon writing to the authorities about the emergency arbitrator's award amounts to interfering with the ₹24,713 crore Reliance-Future deal.
In August last year, Amazon bought 49 per cent in one of Kishore Biyani-led Future Group's unlisted firms -- Future Coupons Ltd (FCL) -- with the right to buy into the listed flagship FRL after a few years, if the government were to undo its bar on foreign ownership of multi-brand retailers.
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FRL ran into a severe cash crunch soon after the nationwide lockdown imposed to curb the coronavirus outbreak. It cut a deal with Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) to sell assets for ₹24,713 crore.
Then, Amazon dragged Future to arbitration at SIAC claiming that its contract with the unlisted FCL barred a transaction with a number of persons and companies, including Reliance.
Amazon has also written to markets regulator Sebi and stock exchanges, urging them to take into consideration the Singapore arbitrator's interim judgement that has put on hold the ₹24,713-crore deal between Future group and RIL while reviewing the proposed transaction.
Last week, Competition Commission of India (CCI) cleared the deal.
FRL has already moved Delhi High Court seeking "reliefs" against Amazon from "interfering" with its RIL deal and alleged that the e-commerce giant was "misusing" an interim order passed by a Singapore arbitrator. Last week, the Delhi High Court reserved its order on the application.
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