Central bank of indiaAccording to a stock exchange filing by the company late Monday evening, the Kishor Biyani-led bank promoted Future Enterprises appointed a forensic auditor on September 12. The non-repaying company has an outstanding debt of Rs 6700 crore.
The development comes amid an out-of-court debt restructuring proposal given by the company to lenders. However, two trade creditors have filed a petition in the bankruptcy court to admit the company for insolvency proceedings. National Company Law Tribunal The company has not yet given its verdict on admitting bankruptcy.
The forensic audit will assess whether there is any element of fraud which led to the default in payments to the banks. The findings of the audit report will be important for the lenders to decide on the resolution of the account. Lenders can consider out-of-court debt restructuring only if the report gives a clean chit to the promoters.
many Future Group Companies defaulted to lenders after deal to sell 19 companies Reliance Industries This year fell in April.
Another Future Group company- Future Retail- is going through insolvency process. The lenders have appointed BDO India to conduct the forensic audit, while Securities and Exchange Board of India Choksi and Chokshi have been ordered to audit Future Retail and concerned entities for the financial year ending March 2020 to March 2022.
Future Group, which was already more leveraged, suffered a setback due to the nationwide lockdown announced in 2020 to contain the spread of COVID-19. Most of their hypermarket stores located in the mall were closed for several months.
In August 2020, it signed an agreement to sell its entire business Reliance Industry-linked subsidiaries in a multi-stage transaction, but a series of litigation by e-commerce giant Amazon.com delayed the deal, claiming breaches of shareholder agreement with the company.
In March, Reliance Industries took possession of the premises containing about 900 Future Retail stores for non-payment of rent. In April this year, most secured lenders rejected the deal with Reliance Industries.