Seychelles court orders unfreezing of Sivasankaran’s global assets

Financial records, affairs, liabilities have been the subject of detailed enquiry

Mr. Sivasankaran was ordered to pay $211 million to BMIC by the London Court in June 2014.

: The Supreme Court of Seychelles has ordered the unfreezing of worldwide assets of NRI entrepreneur C.Sivasankaran (59). The Indian Ocean island country’s top court, on Monday, dismissed all challenges and allegations of BMIC, a subsidiary of the Bahrain-headquartered telecommunications company Batelco Group, as “purely speculative statements and without any evidential support whatsoever”. The court ruled that the Post Bankruptcy Composition Offer is “reasonable, fair and proportionate in the circumstances of the bankrupt’s finances”.

Accordingly, the Supreme Court of Seychelles has cancelled the bankruptcy order made against Mr. Sivasankaran on August 26, 2014 and directed that all his assets all over the world be freed, so that the assets can be utilized to pay the creditors.

Batelco won litigation against Mr. Sivasanakaran and Siva Ltd. in the U.K. after Mr. Sivasankaran was accused of failing to honour a settlement agreement signed in November 2011 relating to a commercial telecommunications venture in India into which both parties had entered in 2009. Mr. Sivasankaran was ordered to pay $211 million to BMIC by the London Court in June 2014. Since he failed to pay up the sum, the court ordered the freezing of his global assets.

However, Mr. Sivasankaran had applied for bankruptcy protection in a Seychelles court and that resulted in Mr. Sivasankaran being declared ‘bankrupt’ on August 26, 2014.

Following this, Mr. Sivasankaran’s financial records, affairs, liabilities have been the subject of detailed enquiry and analysis by the Official Receiver appointed by the Supreme Court of Seychelles with the assistance of an expert accountant over a period of 12 months. This resulted in Mr. Sivasankaran making a Post Bankruptcy Composition Offer pursuant to section 81 Insolvency Act 2013 (as amended) of the Republic of Seychelles, which was approved by all the creditors except BMIC on August 6, 2015.

On August 18, 2015, the independent Official Receiver applied to the court for the approval of the Post Bankruptcy Composition Offer, which was opposed by BMIC.

On January 18th, the Supreme Court of Seychelles cancelled the earlier bankruptcy order and directed the freeing of Mr. Sivasankaran’s assets.