Malvinder, Shivinder settlement talk with RFL runs into trouble

The settlement talks between former Fortis Healthcare promoters — brothers Malvinder Mohan Singh and Shivinder Mohan Singh — and Religare Finvest Limited (RFL) were put on hold on Wednesday after Daiichi Sankyo approached the Delhi High Court.

Asking to stop the talks, Daiichi Sankyo, which is pursuing the execution of the Rs 3,500-crore arbitral award, in its plea said the Singh brothers should first settle their claims before offering settlement to any other parties.

In its verbal observation, the Delhi High court on Wednesday morning said the settlement talks between Singh brothers and RFL cannot proceed without seeking permission from it first. Later in the day, Daiichi Sankyo moved an application seeking to stop the settlement talks.

Japanese drug major Daiichi Sankyo has been fighting a prolonged legal battle with the Singh brothers to get its Rs 3,500-crore arbitration award, based on the judgment by a tribunal. A tribunal in Singapore had held the Singh brothers guilty of lying and concealing information when they had sold their stake in Ranbaxy Laboratories to Daiichi Sankyo in 2008.

The tribunal had held that the brothers had, while selling their stake in Ranbaxy to Daiichi in 2008, hidden information regarding a probe the company was facing from the US Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Justice. To resolve the potential civil and criminal liability that could have arisen due to the suit by both the US agencies, Daiichi had agreed to pay $500 million as part of the settlement agreement. Daiichi had later sold its stake in Ranbaxy to Sun Pharmaceutical Industries in 2015 for a sum of Rs 22,679 crore.

Following their arrest by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Delhi Police, both Malvinder and Shivinder had moved an application before the lower court seeking interim bail. In their plea, the brothers had said that if granted interim bail for two months, they would try and settle the issue with RFL.