Hutchison Telecom International Limited, which recently sold its 67 per cent control in mobile service provider Hutchison Essar to Vodafone, has filed a caveat in the Bombay high court requesting that it be made a party to any suit by the Ruias.
A report in The Observer on Sunday said the bidding war for telecom firm Hutchison Essar will erupt again, with Britain's Vodafone preparing to table a fresh offer that would value the target at up to 19 billion dollars.
Sunil Mittal's Bharti, in which British telecom firm Vodafone has 10 per cent stake, said on Thursday it is yet to hear a final word from the UK-based operator on its plans to buyout Hutchison Telecom's stake in Indian joint venture Hutch-Essar.
Indian corporate house Essar has offered to buy out foreign partner Hutchison Telecom (HTIL) from the mobile joint venture Hutch-Essar for $11 billion (about Rs 50,000 crore), putting the enterprise value at $16.5 billion.
On Thursday, the Bombay high court directed that an Arbitration Tribunal be set up within 30 days for the settlement of disputes between Essar and Hutchison on the termination of BPL (Mumbai) circle sale deal by the former.
Official sources said the proposal of Essar, which was seeking to increase its equity held through foreign subsidiaries by 6.26 per cent to 22.04 per cent has been approved.
After the $11.1 billion winning bid by Vodafone for Hutchison, the spotlight now shifts to the Ruia-owned BPL Mobile Communications.
India is believed to have challenged in a court in The Hague an arbitration tribunal verdict that overturned its demand for Rs 10,247 crore in back taxes from Cairn Energy Plc -- the second time in three months that it has refused to accept an international award against retrospective tax.
The Finance Ministry has already circulated a draft Cabinet note withdrawing the conciliation offer to Vodafone to resolve the Rs 20,000-crore (Rs 200-billion) tax dispute case.
Telecom regulator Trai has initiated action against cellular operators including Bharti, Idea and Hutchison for defying its order on selective blocking of calls originating and terminating in some basic service operators' networks.
A bench headed by Justice H L Dattu, however, allowed the petitioner, former Additional Solicitor General Bishwajit Bhattacharyya, to file fresh petition with all the relevant documents stating what action Centre has so far been taken on the issue.
Hutchison Telecom on Monday entered into a deal with Essar Group to buy over BPL's stake and Essar SpaceTel for $1.15 billion (about Rs 4,900 crore).
Vodafone pleaded in High Court that IT department had no jurisdiction in the transfer pricing case because the said transaction was not international and did not attract tax.
Consolidating its position in the Hutchison-Essar telecom venture, Ruias' Essar Teleholding have increased their stake to 30.42 per cent in the JV by buying out 3.43 per cent stake held by a Hutch's subsidiary Usha Martin Telemetics for Rs 267 crore
Max India on Monday said it would completely exit from the telecom business by divesting its meagre stake of about two per cent in the cellular operator Hutchison India to raise funds for its healthcare and insurance services.
To decide whether capital gains on surrender of call options are taxable
Indian affiliates of Hong Kong's Hutchison Whampoa Ltd claimed a world first on Tuesday as they launched a service in which mobile phones are automatically updated with text news headlines.\n\n\n\n
Two private cellular operators in Delhi -- AirTel and Hutchison-Essar complained on Friday of disruption in calls from cell-to-fixed line phones and vice versa even as state owned Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd dismissed
Cellular service provider Hutch will spend Rs 200 crore (Rs 2 billion) on network expansion in Rajasthan this year.
Courts in five countries including the US and the UK have given recognition to an arbitration award that asked India to return $1.4 billion to Cairn Energy plc - a step that now opens the possibility of the British firm seizing Indian assets in those countries if New Delhi does not pay, sources said. Cairn Energy had moved courts in nine countries to enforce its $1.4 billion arbitral award against India, which the company won after a dispute with the country's revenue authority over a retroactively applied capital gains tax. Of these, the December 21 award from a three-member tribunal at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Netherlands has been recognised and confirmed by courts in the US, the UK, Netherlands, Canada and France, three people with knowledge of the matter said.
Vodafone, according to sources, in its response to the Finance Ministry's offer for conciliation, had expressed keenness to settle the long-pending capital gains tax dispute.
Special CBI Judge O P Saini adjourned Monday's proceedings in the wake of stay granted by the Supreme Court on separate pleas filed by Mittal and Ruia challenging the March 19 order of the trial court summoning them as accused in the case.
The company will spend Rs 10,141 crore to buy 15.5 per cent stake from minority investors.
Severe jolt to Sahara Group, strict scrutiny of mining activities and scrapping of licences for 2G spectrum dominated the corporate legal battle in 2012 in the Supreme Court which gave a decisive victory to telecom major Vodafone in a Rs 11,000 crore tax case.
The companies are being probed into for alleged corruption in spectrum allocation during NDA regime.
In the course of the investigations, CBI has found irregular allocation of additional spectrum beyond 6.2 MHz to 10 MHz to GSM operators, including Bharti and Vodafone during Mahajan's rule.
SC directs CBI to take action over extra spectrum allocation during NDA rule.
Delaying GAAR is seen as a move partly designed to help solve Vodafone dispute.
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Faced with over Rs 11,200 crore (Rs 112 billion) tax liability, Vodafone India chief Analjit Singh on Thursday met Finance Minister P Chidambaram for the second time this week and expressed the hope that there will be clarity soon on the proposal to settle the dispute through conciliation.
A presentation by the CBI to a Joint Parliamentary Committee last week said the decision led to a loss of Rs 508 crore to the exchequer.
Special CBI Judge O P Saini adjourned today's proceedings after advocate Siddharth Agarwal, appearing for Mittal, said the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear in March the separate pleas filed by Mittal and Ruia challenging the March 19, 2013 order of the trial court summoning them as accused in the case.
Lok Sabha passes Finance Bill; Will introduce a white paper on black money in current session: FM
Finance Minister P Chidambaram has asked UK-based Vodafone Group, which is facing a tax liability of over Rs 11,200 crore in India, to give its view on the long-pending matter in writing, a senior official said.
US-based technology major IBM is contesting a claim of the revenue department which has increased the company's taxable income substantially to around Rs 11,000 crore (Rs 110 billion).
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