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TMI Blog2020 (8) TMI 420X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... nts - Corporate Debtors. The facts involved and the Appellant is common in all the five proceedings. The Appellant filed Applications under Section 22 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 (IBC - in short) that the Interim Resolution Professional (IRP) - Pavan Kankani had called third meeting of Committee of Creditors (COC) consisting of the Appellant Bank with 100% voting share and COC resolved in the third meeting dated 08.02.2020 to replace IRP with one Mr. B. Naga Bhushan - Resolution Professional. It appears that the respective insolvency proceedings (of these Appeals) were initiated under Section 10 of IBC and the initial IRP - Mr. Pavan Kankani was appointed at the instance of the Corporate Debtor/s. In the third meeting of COC ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... and for the sake of convenience, it would be appropriate to reproduce the Order from the record of Company Appeal (AT) (Ins) No.497 of 2020:- "ORDER This is an application filed by the sole Financial Creditor seeking replacement of IRP. 2. The brief facts that led to the Application are as follows. The Authority by an order dated 15.11.2019 admitted the Company Petition and directed initiation of the Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process (CIRP) of the respondent corporate debtor. It appointed Mr. PavanKankani as the Interim Resolution Professional (IRP). The Committee of Creditors (CoC) of which the present applicant is the sole member in its 3rd meeting on 08.02.2020 resolved to replace the IRP and appoint one Mr. B. Naga Bhusha ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ner the CIRP is to be concluded, the CoC cannot have the luxury of taking its own time. The CoC having not resolved to replace the IRP in its first meeting could not be allowed to replace him by a resolution in any of its subsequent meetings. The application, therefore, cannot be allowed. Hence ordered. ORDER The application be and the same is rejected. No costs." 3. We are considering the Appeal No.497 of 2020 as the leading Appeal and we will refer to the documents from this Appeal. 4. The learned Counsel for the Appellants states that this Tribunal has already in the matter of "Punjab National Bank Versus Mr. Kiran Shah" - Company Appeal (AT) (Ins) 749 of 2019 (in para - 2) which was pronounced on 6th August, 2019 and in the mat ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... interim resolution professional as a resolution professional or to replace the interim resolution professional by another resolution professional." Section 27 reads as under:- "27. Replacement of resolution professional by committee of creditors.-(1) Where, at any time during the corporate insolvency resolution process, the committee of creditors is of the opinion that a resolution professional appointed under section 22 is required to be replaced, it may replace him with another resolution professional in the manner provided under this section. (2) The committee of creditors may, at a meeting, by a vote of sixty-six per cent of voting shares, resolve to replace the resolution professional appointed under section 22 with another res ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... provision was substituted with effect from 6th June, 2018 and now the provision in Section 16(5) provides - "The term of the Interim Resolution Professional shall continue till the date of appointment of the Resolution Professional under Section 22." It is rightly submitted by the learned Counsel that the earlier provision created serious difficulty if for any reason in the first meeting, the RP was not appointed and thus the law recognised that there could be situations where this may have to be done on a subsequent occasion. The learned Counsel for the Appellant has rightly referred also to Regulation 17 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (Insolvency Resolution Process for Corporate Persons) Regulations, 2016 where Regulation ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... t the Adjudicating Authority has clearly erred in its approach, we are dispensing with issuing of Notices to the Respondents. The IRP who is representing the Respondents is even otherwise expected to be dispassionate. IRP is not supposed to be having any personal interest in any given matter and is expected to discharge duties as required under the provisions of IBC and its Regulations. As there are no personal allegations against the IRP and the Appellants as COC, has in the five respective matters exercised their discretion under the law and this being so, we are not issuing Notices in these Appeals. Issuing of Notices to the Respondents would only further prolong the Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process which would not be in the inter ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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