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Informist, Tuesday, Dec. 17, 2024

 

NEW DELHI – The Delhi High Court on Tuesday cleared the way for Bennet Coleman & Co. Ltd. and Times Internet Ltd. to remit funds to their wholly owned offshore subsidiaries BCCL Worldwide Inc. and Times Internet Inc, respectively, in the form of overseas direct investments. The high court quashed the Enforcement Director's rejection letter against Bennet Coleman and Times Internet for no-objection certificate to remit funds.

 

Bennet Coleman is an Indian media conglomerate running operations as The Times of India and The Economic Times newspapers, among others. Times Internet--a subsidiary of Bennet Coleman--is a digital venture of The Times of India group. 

 

The high court said that Bennet Coleman and Times Internet were free to approach the authorised dealer--bank--for remittance of investment abroad. The given remittance shall be proceeded on its own merits as per applicable rules under the Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999. 

 

"The respondents (Enforcement Directorate) have thus not demonstrated the contravention of FEMA, 1999 with clear basis, in order to deny the NOC (no-objection certificate). There must be a nexus between the alleged contravention and the proposing investment which has not been established in the present case," said the court.

 

Bennet Coleman and Times Internet are Indian entities classified as "person resident in India" in terms of Section 2 (b)(ii) of the Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999. In 2021, Bennet Coleman and Times Internet received summons under the 1999 Act, from the Enforcement Directorate, seeking certain documents and information. Bennet Coleman and Times Internet said that they duly complied with the summons, providing the requisite information, and emphasised that no proceedings under the 1999 Act were initiated against them by the agency thereafter.

 

Thereafter, Bennet Coleman and Times Internet applied for no-objection certificates under Rule 10 of the Foreign Exchange Management (Overseas Investment) Rules, 2022. However, the Enforcement Directorate rejected the applications, against which Bennet Coleman and Times Internet moved the high court. After the rejection of the no-objection certificate, the agency issued fresh summons to Times Internet to appear before them in terms of an ongoing investigation.  End

 

Reported by Surya Tripathi

Edited by Akul Nishant Akhoury

 

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