National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) refused to grant immediate interim relief to Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd shareholder Mad Man Film Ventures over the collapsed Zee-Sony Merger. The Mumbai bench of the tribunal has given Sony two weeks to file its response to the pleas by Mad Man Films Ventures.
Mad Man Film Ventures wanted the tribunal to order that any other proceedings in the Zee-Sony case filed by either of the two parties’ companies – Culver Max Entertainment and Bangla Entertainment, in any jurisdiction would be subject to the outcome of the case at NCLT.
The NCLT had issued a notice to Culver Max (formerly Sony Pictures Networks) on Tuesday in response to an application filed by Zee Entertainment Enterprises. Zee’s application seeks the implementation of the $10 billion merger with Sony that was announced back in December 2022.
A panel comprising judicial member Lakshmi Gurung and technical member Charanjeet Singh Gulati instructed Sony Pictures to submit a response to the application within a two-week period.
The tribunal has scheduled the hearing on this matter for March 12.
NCLT gave the merger a go-ahead on August 10, 2023. This is why only NCLT had the jurisdiction to pass judgement on the merger, argued Senior Advocate Janak Dwarkadas.
On the other hand, Senior Advocate Darius Khambata, representing Sony, informed the tribunal that the company was already in the midst of preparing an application to contest the maintainability of Zee’s petition and requested that this application be scheduled for consideration alongside the current one on the upcoming date.
NCLT had granted a hearing to the plea of Mad Men Film, a Zee Entertainment Enterprises Limited shareholder seeking the execution of the terminated merger.
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