Tata Sons cannot forcibly buy Cyrus Mistry's shares for now: NCLAT
New Delhi, Aug 24 : In a temporary relief to Cyrus Mistry, the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) on Friday stated that Tata Sons cannot force him to sell his shares till the disposal of his appeal.
However, the appellate tribunal declined his plea for a stay on the conversion of Tata Sons into a private company.
The two-judge bench headed by Justice S.J. Mukhopadhyaya said it will decide on the conversion of Tata Sons, parent company of $103 billion Tata Group, from a public limited company into a private limited company after hearing the final arguments. The next hearing of the case is slated for September 24.
Mistry, who took over as Tata Group Chairman in December 2012 and was ousted in October 2016 by the Tata Sons board, had filed the petition with the NCLAT against the July 9 decision of the NCLT (National Company Law Tribunal) Mumbai bench.
The bench had upheld the decision of the Tata Sons board dismissing Mistry as Chairman.
On July 9, the NCLT Mumbai bench ruled that the Tata Sons Board of Directors was competent to remove the Executive Chairman and that Mistry was ejected as the board members had lost confidence in him.
The NCLT verdict had come on a petition filed by Mistry after he was abruptly ousted as the Chairman that had created an upheaval in the Indian corporate world.
Mistry later quit from the board of other six Tata Group companies but challenged the Group, and former and interim Chairman Ratan Tata's decisions, before the NCLT.
Last September, the shareholders of Tata Sons agreed to convert the public limited company into a private limited company, which in effect would restrict any shareholder from selling its stake to outsiders.
The shareholders approved the conversion saying it would help the company become more swift in decision making despite Mistry's opposition to it. Mistry, through his family firms Cyrus Investments and Sterling Investments, owns 18.4 per cent of Tata Sons while 66 per cent is owned by Tata Trusts.
Mistry's family had termed the decision as an act of oppression of minority shareholders.
On August 10, the Registrar of Companies approved the decision of Tata Sons to go private.
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Austrian police detain suspect in case of rat poison found in baby food jars on supermarket shelves
Vienna (AP): Police in eastern Austria say a 39-year-old suspect has been arrested after rat poison turned up in some HiPP baby food jars on supermarket shelves in central Europe.
HiPP, which recalled some of its baby food jars in Austria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic after the case came to light last month, said in a statement Saturday it was “greatly relieved” by the arrest, and would provide further updates as verified details come in.
The Burgenland State Criminal Police Office, under the direction of prosecutors, said a probe was launched after poison turned up in a baby food jar purchased at a supermarket in the city of Eisenstadt on April 18.
It said the suspect was being questioned, and that no further details would be immediately provided. The Burgenland public prosecutor's office has announced an investigation into suspected “intentional endangerment of the public.”
The Austrian Press Agency reported that an expert report on the toxicity of the poison was pending. A total of five tampered baby food jars were seized before they could be consumed, APA reported.
Authorities said previously they believe the tampering occurred in 190-gram (6.7-ounce) jars of baby food made with carrots and potatoes for 5-month-olds that were sold from SPAR supermarkets in Austria.
HiPP responded by recalling all of its baby food jars sold at SPAR supermarkets — which include SPAR, EUROSPAR, INTERSPAR and Maximarkt stores — in Austria as a precaution. Vendors in Slovakia and the Czech Republic also removed all of the brand's baby jars from sale.
The company said the recall was not due to any product or quality defect on its part, and said the jars left its facility in “perfect condition.”
Police said a customer at the time of the discovery had reported that a jar appeared to have been tampered with, but no one had consumed the baby food.
