Will send you to jail in Daiichi-Ranbaxy case: SC warns Singh brothers

The Supreme Court on Friday, April 5, informed the former Ranbaxy promoters, Malvinder Singh and Shivinder Singh, that they could go to jail for disobeying orders to pay dues to Japanese firm Daiichi Sankyo as directed by a Singapore tribunal. The apex court had directed both the Singh brothers—Malvinder Singh and Shivinder Singh—to come up with a plan to secure the Singaporean arbitration award of Rs 3,500 crore.

A bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi stated that it will now straightaway hear the contempt petition against the Singh brothers for non-payment of the arbitral award amount to Daiichi Sankyo and send them to jail if the violation of its orders is established. The bench, which also included, Justices Deepak Gupta and Sanjiv Khanna, has now fixed the contempt petition of the Japanese firms against the former Ranbaxy promoters for hearing on April 11.

"You may be owning half of the world but there is no concrete plan as to how the arbitral amount would be realised. You said that somebody owed you Rs 6,000 crore. But this is neither here nor there," the bench said. The Japanese firm's contempt plea against the Singh brothers seeks recovery of Rs 4,000 crore from them as directed by the Singapore tribunal.

Back in 2008, Daiichi had bought Ranbaxy. Later, it had moved the Singapore arbitration tribunal accusing that the Singh brothers had concealed information that Ranbaxy was facing a probe by the US Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Justice while selling its shares.

(Inputs from agencies)