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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US SC rejects 26/11 attack accused Tahawwur Rana’s plea seeking stay on his extradition to India
New York, Apr 7 (PTI): The US Supreme Court has rejected 26/11 Mumbai terror attack accused Tahawwur Rana's appeal seeking a stay on his extradition to India, moving him closer to being handed over to Indian authorities to face justice.
Rana, 64, a Canadian national of Pakistani origin, is currently lodged at a metropolitan detention centre in Los Angeles.
He is known to be associated with Pakistani-American terrorist David Coleman Headley, one of the main conspirators of the 26/11 attacks. Headley conducted a recce of Mumbai before the attacks by posing as an employee of Rana’s immigration consultancy.
Rana had submitted an ‘Emergency Application For Stay Pending Litigation of Petition For Writ of Habeas Corpus' on February 27, 2025, with Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and Circuit Justice for the Ninth Circuit Elena Kagan.
Kagan had denied the application earlier last month.
Rana had then renewed his ‘Emergency Application for Stay Pending Litigation of Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus previously addressed to Justice Kagan’, and requested that the renewed application be directed to US Chief Justice John Roberts.
An order on the Supreme Court website noted that Rana's renewed application had been “distributed for Conference” on April 4 and the “application” has been “referred to the Court.”
A notice on the Supreme Court website Monday said that “Application denied by the Court.”
Rana was convicted in the US of one count of conspiracy to provide material support to the terrorist plot in Denmark and one count of providing material support to Pakistan-based terrorist organisation Lashker-e-Taiba which was responsible for the attacks in Mumbai.
New York-based Indian-American attorney Ravi Batra had told PTI that Rana had made his application to the Supreme Court to prevent extradition, which Justice Kagan denied on March 6. The application was then submitted before Roberts, “who has shared it with the Court to conference so as to harness the entire Court’s view.”
The Supreme Court justices are Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr., Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Associate Justice Elena Kagan, Associate Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, Associate Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett, and Associate Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.
In his emergency application, Rana had sought a stay of his extradition and surrender to India pending litigation (including exhaustion of all appeals) on the merits of his February 13.
In that petition, Rana argued that his extradition to India violates US law and the UN Convention Against Torture "because there are substantial grounds for believing that, if extradited to India, the petitioner will be in danger of being subjected to torture."
"The likelihood of torture in this case is even higher though as petitioner faces acute risk as a Muslim of Pakistani origin charged in the Mumbai attacks,” the application said.
The application also said that his “severe medical conditions” render extradition to Indian detention facilities a “de facto" death sentence in this case.
The US Supreme Court denied Rana's petition for a writ of certiorari relating to his original habeas petition on January 21. The application notes that on that same day, newly-confirmed Secretary of State Marco Rubio had met with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar.
When Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived in Washington on February 12 to meet with Trump, Rana’s counsel received a letter from the Department of State, stating that “on February 11, 2025, the Secretary of State decided to authorise” Rana’s "surrender to India,” pursuant to the “Extradition Treaty between the United States and India”.
Rana’s Counsel requested from the State Department the complete administrative record on which Secretary Rubio based his decision to authorize Rana’s surrender to India.
The Counsel also requested immediate information of any commitment the United States has obtained from India with respect to Rana’s treatment. “The government declined to provide any information in response to these requests,” the application said.
It added that given Rana’s underlying health conditions and the State Department’s findings regarding the treatment of prisoners, it is very likely “Rana will not survive long enough to be tried in India".
During a joint press conference with Prime Minister Modi in the White House in February, President Donald Trump announced that his administration has approved the extradition of "very evil" Rana, wanted by Indian law enforcement agencies for his role in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, "to face justice in India”.
A total of 166 people, including six Americans, were killed in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks in which 10 Pakistani terrorists laid a more than 60-hour siege, attacking and killing people at iconic and vital locations in Mumbai.
