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Royal Manpower Services Through Its ... vs Faridabad Autocomp System Private ...

National Company Law Appellate Tribunal6 May 2024Ashok Bhushan

Ratio decidendi

The rule this decision rests on

Where the operational creditor's own materials, including a police complaint and a demand-notice reply, show a dispute over payment of dues existing before the demand notice was issued, the existence of a pre-existing dispute is established and the Section 9 application is properly rejected on that ground; the Tribunal will not disturb such a finding on appeal where the Adjudicating Authority has correctly identified it from the record.

Written by Miss Lucy from the judgment below, not taken from a headnote.

Judgment

As delivered

NATIONAL COMPANY LAW APPELLATE TRIBUNALPRINCIPAL BENCH, NEW DELHIComp. App. (AT) (Ins) No. 880 of 2024&I.A. No. 3111, 3178 of 2024

IN THE MATTER OF: Royal Manpower Services through its proprietor, Vasudev ....Appellant

Vs.

Faridabad Autocomp Systems Pvt. Ltd. ....Respondent Present: For Appellant: Mr. Karan Gandhi, Advocate For Respondent:

ORDER

(Hybrid Mode)

06.05.2024: Heard the Ld. Counsel for the Appellant. This appeal has

been filed against the order dated 23.11.2023 by which Section 9 application

filed by the Appellant has been dismissed on the ground of pre-existing

dispute.

2. Adjudicating Authority in paragraph 7 extracted the pre-existing dispute

between the parties which paragraph 7 is as follows:

CA (AT) No. 134 of 2024 2

7. On perusal of the records, it is observed that the Corporate Debtor in its reply has placed on record the copy of police complaints against the Petitioner which was made prior to issue of demand notice. Relevant extract of the translated copy of the said complaint is as under: -

On 12/10/2017, the owner of Royal Manpower Services along with 25-30 persons came and stopped the function of my company. The contractor of Royal Manpower company supply manpower to my company. Due to bad services, the management of my company has given the contract to CD Manpower. This contract is effected from 01/09/2017. There was no work of Royal Manpower in this company. And on 12/10/2017, came in the premises of my company and without any reason stopped work and has taken law in their hands, the police officer came and settled the matter and started the work. They threatened to disconnect the electricity of the company and by threatening the labours separated from the workplace and said if anyone has done the work it will not be good.

On happening of this incident all workers of my company are mentally upset. Royal Manpower Services has not deposited by deducting from the worker - PF and ESI contribution of the workers. Due to the reason, I gave my contract to other contractor. Owing to this they messed up so and created a panic by coming with 25-30 persons in the complex of company. So, it is requested that this type of incident will not occur in future and we can do the work easily and peacefully in your jurisdiction. Names of some persons of Royal Manpower are following who came inside the company premises and to execute the incident. Yogesh Huda, Surendra Huda, Anis, Rohit, Mohit, Sonu, Rahu, Basu and others whose names I don't know. So, it is requested that this type of incident won't be repeated in future and give us police protection so that we can do our work smoothly. Our talk kept going collectively so far but now we want legal action".

CA (AT) (Ins) No. 880 of 2024 3 3. The Ld. Counsel for the Appellant submits that the dispute which was

noticed in paragraph 7 was resolved and the corporate debtor agreed to make

the payment which was not made. He submits that this was not a case of any

pre-existing dispute and even the complaint is of 12.10.2017 whereas the claim

was of July and August, 2017.

4. We have considered the submissions of the Counsel for the Appellant

and perused the record.

5. What has been indicated by the Adjudicating Authority in paragraph 7

clearly indicates that dispute existed in October, 2017 and the police complaint

was filed on 12.10.2017 by the corporate debtor against the operational

creditor. Appellant itself has brought the detailed papers of the police

complaint in the appeal at pg. 74. We have looked into the page 74 of the

appeal which indicate a report submitted by ASI on 11.11.2017 on the

complaint which clearly indicate that there is dispute pertaining to money

transaction. The report of the ASI which has been brought on the record itself

indicate the dispute was there with regard to payment of dues hence, the pre-

existing dispute is proved from the materials which have been brought on the

record by the Appellant himself. Further, the demand notice was issued by the

operational creditor to the corporate debtor which was replied vide letter dated

15.06.2018. In the reply the demand notice the claim was refuted and the

reasons given for refuting the claims which reply to demand notice has been

CA (AT) (Ins) No. 880 of 2024 4

brought on record at pg. 202. A perusal of the reply to demand notice indicates

that dispute existed between the parties. Hence, we are of the view that the

Adjudicating Authority did not commit an error rejecting the application on the

ground of pre-existing dispute. The Appeal is dismissed.

[Justice Ashok Bhushan] Chairperson

[Barun Mitra] Member (Technical)

[Arun Baroka] Member (Technical)

sr/nn

CA (AT) (Ins) No. 880 of 2024

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