Bank of Baroda vs Sri Vamsi Kambhammettu

Oral Judgment : Justice Sharad Kumar Sharma, Member (Judicial):

The Appellant in the instant Company Appeal, being Company Appeal (AT) (CH) (INS) No. 06 / 2026 has come down with their case, that the impugned order of 13.11.2025 that has been passed by the Ld. Adjudicating Authority, NCLT, Hyderabad Bench in IA (IBC) / 1681 / 2025, as it was preferred in CP (IB) / 54 / 95 / HDB / 2021 is bad on account of the fact that the aspect of condonation of delay in filing of its claim and the admission of the claim has not been appropriately considered by the Ld. Tribunal on its merits. The Appellant submits that the Appellant that the claim filed by him has been rejected by the Ld. Tribunal on the ground that the same had been preferred with the delay of 413 days.

It’s the case of the Appellant that the Appellant Bank under a Consortium Lending Arrangement, had extended various credit facilities on the basis of the securities, mortgage and personal guarantees, to M/s. ICOMM Tele Limited, the Corporate Debtor was later put under CIRP in 2019 and a part of amount under the approved Resolution Plan was received by it.

Subsequently, Section 95 application was filed by M/s. L & T Infrastructure Private Limited, seeking initiation of the insolvency resolution process (IRP) as against the Personal Guarantor Mr. Sumanth Paturu. The said Application was admitted by Ld. NCLT by the order dated 11.07.2024 and an Interim Resolution Professional (IRP) was appointed, to supervise and implement the IRP process. The IRP as per the provisions of I & B Code, 2016, issued a public announcement on 22.07.2024 inviting claims as against the Personal Guarantor and fixing 08.08.2024, as the last date for submission of claim. The Appellant Bank submitted its claim to the IRP on 12.09.2025 which was rejected by the IRP on account of delay of 413 days. Against this rejection, Appellant Bank filed an Application before Ld. NCLT seeking condonation of delay and a direction to RP to admit its claim which was also dismissed by Ld. NCLT, holding that belated claims cannot be entertained.

It is the case of the Appellant, that the delay chanced because, due to administrative restructuring, frequent transfers, on-going DRT proceedings and parallel recovery proceedings against the Guarantors they were unable to pursue the matter in time and could not file their claim within the time period as prescribed in the public announcement of 22.07.2024. Besides that, they have submitted that they have not received the timely intimation regarding the Section 95 proceedings and upon becoming aware of the proceedings, they filed their claim on 12.09.2025.

The Ld. Counsel for the Appellant has argued that, all these grounds as above for delayed filing of the claim, were argued before the Ld. Tribunal but, those factors have not been considered, that his submissions were rejected on the technical grounds of delay without going into the merits of the case, that his claim arises from the same loan transactions already acknowledged in the CIRP proceedings against the Corporate Debtor and its rejection on the sole ground of delay while Section 95 proceedings is still on-going is against the principles of equitable treatment under the Code and hence, the order will be bad in the eyes of law.

The question of consideration of the factors leading to delayed filing of a claim apart from the fact that it was very feebly contested, was not even projected in the pleading that was raised before the Ld. Tribunal. Further, the pleadings now being submitted before this Appellate Forum seeking to justify the delayed filing of the claim, was not pleaded by the Appellant before the Ld. Adjudicating Authority .

So far as the argument extended by the Ld. Counsel for the Appellant is concerned, the administrative reasons cited by him to explain the delay in filing of the claim cannot exclusively be taken as to be the basis for extending the time for filing of the claim, beyond the time period prescribed by the public announcement dated 22.07.2024, unless there exist sufficiently strong extraneous circumstances that caused a delay of 413 days in filing the claim. The delay is not an aspect which is disputed. The question is that, whether the reason cited for delay at all could be a reason to warrant extension of time to admit a claim filed with a delay of 413 days.

The Ld. Counsel for the Respondent has submitted that the grounds, narrated in the impugned order that the list of Creditors has already been prepared and the repayment plan has also been considered by the Committee of Creditors, would itself be a sufficient ground not to entertain a belated claim and that too, when plausible explanation was given and pleaded or argued before Ld. NCLT for belated submission of the claim. Hence, the impugned order of rejecting the claim as submitted by IA (IBC) / 1681 / 2025 with the delay of 413 days cannot be faulted in any manner whatsoever, particularly when, the application IA (IBC) / 1681 / 2025 did not contain even a single pleading raised by the Appellant justifying the belated filing of the claim.

In the absence of there being any specific pleading succinctly explaining the delayed filing of the claim, in the application itself, the impugned order cannot be said to be faulted in any manner whatsoever.

Besides that, since the invitation of claim has been done by way of a public announcement, it would be deemed that it was in the knowledge of the Appellant since invitation of claim was falling in a public domain, and still, if the Appellant has chosen on its own to file a claim only on 12.09.2025, the rejection of the same on the ground of having been preferred with a delay, and that too a delay which has been un-explained and attempted to be explained only for the first time at this appellate stage, does not require to be interfered by us.

Hence, the Company Appeal (AT) (CH) (INS) / 06 / 2026 lacks merit and the same is accordingly dismissed.