The Ahmedabad bench of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) on Thursday asked the debt-laden Essar Steel’s committee of creditors (CoC) to consider afresh the first round of bids submitted by Numetal and ArcelorMittal, which were rejected by the resolution professional (RP) on the ground that their promoters had links with defaulter companies.

The NCLT bench of judges Harihar Prakash Chaturvedi and Manorama Kumari ordered the reconsideration of the resolution plans by both companies as the RP had not followed certain provisions of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) while rejecting the bids. The RP did not grant enough time to the companies to explain their view and turned down bids much before the final date, the NCLT observed.

While the first bids submitted on February 12, 2018 go back to CoC and RP for a relook, the second round of bids – on April 2 – was not required at this stage, the court observed without elaborating more on the fate of the second round bids. ArcelorMittal in partnership with Nippon of Japan, Anil Agarwal’s Vedanta and Numetal along with Sajjan Jindal’s JSW Steel had submitted bids in the second round, which are yet to be opened.

The bench also excluded the period involving legal proceedings in the matter (from March 20 to April 19) from the 270-day deadline for the RP to evaluate and approve the resolution plan. The earlier deadline was April 29. According to the IBC, 2016, a resolution plan has to be finalised and approved within 270 days of a company’s admission to the NCLT.

Reacting to the verdict, a Numetal spokesperson stated, “We welcome the order pronounced by NCLT Ahmedabad by returning the matter back to the CoC for considering our original bid. We have put forth a very compelling resolution plan both industrially and financially. We hope our proposal will be considered by the CoC with a fair and holistic view.”

An ArcelorMittal spokesperson said the company was always confident about its eligibility and it was fully confident even now with regard to eligibility. “We in partnership with Nippon Steel have submitted a strong and competitive industrial plan for Essar Steel. And, we remain very confident of it,” he said.