Issues: (i) Whether the EPC contract was frustrated by efflux of time; (ii) Whether the amounts claimed under the EPC contract constituted operational debt; (iii) Whether a pre-existing dispute barred the insolvency application; and (iv) Whether the application under Section 9 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 was barred by limitation.

Issue (i): Whether the EPC contract was frustrated by efflux of time.

Analysis: The contractual termination provisions made termination elective and subject to stipulated notices. Neither party terminated the contract, and suspension due to non-payment did not amount to termination. Efflux of time concerns the natural expiry of a contract, whereas frustration under Section 56 of the Indian Contract Act, 1872 requires an unforeseen supervening impossibility. A suspension resulting from the parties' own non-performance is not such an impossibility, and time was not stipulated to be of the essence.

Conclusion: The EPC contract was not frustrated by efflux of time and continued to subsist.

Issue (ii): Whether the amounts claimed under the EPC contract constituted operational debt.

Analysis: Amounts payable under the contractual payment schedule were consideration for goods and works supplied under the EPC contract and consequently fell within operational debt. Suspension, idling and demobilization charges arose from the alleged contractual breach and were damages; such damages do not become operational debt unless assessed and crystallised by a competent forum.

Conclusion: Contractual milestone payments qualified as operational debt, but the claims for suspension, idling and demobilization charges did not qualify as operational debt unless adjudicated and crystallised.

Issue (iii): Whether a pre-existing dispute barred the insolvency application.

Analysis: A Section 9 application is barred only by a genuine, pre-existing dispute, which need not have culminated in litigation or arbitration but must be evidenced by conduct or communications. The corporate debtor did not respond to the repeated legal notices or the statutory demand notice and raised its defence only in response to the insolvency application. Its total and consistent silence was material evidence that no genuine dispute existed at the relevant time.

Conclusion: No pre-existing dispute existed to bar the Section 9 application.

Issue (iv): Whether the application under Section 9 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 was barred by limitation.

Analysis: Under Sections 3(12) and 238A of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016, read with Article 137 of the Schedule to the Limitation Act, 1963, limitation runs from the date on which the debt became due and payable and default occurred. Each invoice or payment default has its own limitation period; continued subsistence of the contract does not create a continuing cause of action for an accrued default. The liabilities were acknowledged in January and February 2012, but the insolvency application was not pursued within three years. Legal notices issued by the creditor could not reset limitation, since Section 18 of the Limitation Act, 1963 requires a written acknowledgment by the party against whom the claim is made.

Conclusion: The Section 9 application was time-barred because the defaults occurred more than three years before its filing and no valid acknowledgment or condonation extended limitation.

Final Conclusion: The insolvency admission could not stand because the operational-debt claim invoked for insolvency was barred by limitation, notwithstanding that the EPC contract subsisted and no pre-existing dispute was established.

Ratio Decidendi: For a Section 9 insolvency application, limitation runs separately from the date each operational debt becomes due and unpaid; subsistence of the underlying contract and unilateral creditor notices do not create a continuing cause of action or extend limitation without a valid acknowledgment by the debtor.

Issues: Whether unadjudicated interest and damages under the provident fund law, not determined before commencement of the corporate insolvency resolution process, must be provided for in an approved resolution plan.

Analysis: Provident fund dues may stand excluded from the liquidation estate under Section 36(4)(a)(iii) of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016. However, interest and damages under Sections 7Q and 14B of the Employees' Provident Funds and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1952, which had neither been determined nor become final before commencement of the corporate insolvency resolution process, are contingent and uncrystallized liabilities. A resolution plan may make a lump-sum provision for such liabilities in the commercial wisdom of the Committee of Creditors, but absence of such provision does not by itself violate the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016. The resolution applicant is entitled to certainty regarding liabilities assumed under the plan, and approval of a Committee-approved plan may be declined only on the limited grounds under Section 30(2) of that Code.

Conclusion: Uncrystallized claims for interest and damages need not be included in the approved resolution plan; exclusion of those claims was valid and the issue is decided against the appellant.

Ratio Decidendi: Unadjudicated statutory interest and damages that remain uncrystallized on the commencement date of the corporate insolvency resolution process are contingent liabilities, and their omission from a Committee-approved resolution plan does not contravene the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016.

Issues: Whether a moratorium against the corporate debtor under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 prevents continuation of a consumer complaint against non-corporate-debtor co-respondents.

Analysis: The statutory moratorium under Section 14 is confined to the corporate debtor and cannot be extended to directors, promoters, associated entities or other respondents unless the statute expressly so provides. As no moratorium protected the co-respondents, their potential liability required adjudication in the consumer complaint. The Commission could not, while acknowledging that liability remained undetermined, foreclose proceedings against them by attributing the alleged deficiency exclusively to the corporate debtor at an interlocutory stage.

Conclusion: The consumer complaint may proceed against the co-respondents notwithstanding the moratorium applicable to the corporate debtor; their liability and objections must be determined on merits by the Commission.

Issues: Whether pending civil and arbitral proceedings concerning operational-credit claims, which had not crystallised into determinable and quantifiable claims before approval of the resolution plan, survived the approved resolution plan.

Analysis: The final list of operational creditors quantified the disputed claims at a notional value of Re.1 and did not preserve them subject to the outcome of pending proceedings. The resolution plan, which had attained finality, provided that the settlement corpus available to relevant operational creditors was payable pro rata only for crystallised and approved claims within the stipulated period. Its provisions, read harmoniously, discharged and extinguished pre-effective-date liabilities and required pending proceedings by operational creditors to be withdrawn, abated, settled or extinguished. The clean slate and fresh start principles preclude indeterminate claims from resurfacing after plan approval. There was no ambiguity warranting application of contra proferentem or adoption of a face-value reservation mechanism.

Conclusion: Pending civil and arbitral claims that had not crystallised by approval of the resolution plan stood abated, waived, withdrawn and extinguished; the operational creditors were entitled to no amount beyond their quantified Re.1 claims. The issue is decided in favour of the appellant.

Outcome: The civil appeal was dismissed and the accompanying interlocutory application(s) were disposed of.

Issues: Whether adjudicatory orders founded on fake, non-existent or hallucinated AI-generated precedents can be sustained in law, and whether such orders require to be set aside.

Analysis: The judgment records that the adjudicating authority relied upon citations and passages that were non-existent, incorrectly attributed, or otherwise hallucinated, and that the appellate tribunal failed to detect the defect. It holds that a decision based on fake or hallucinated material as precedent contaminates the adjudicatory process, subverts the integrity of judicial determination, and amounts to no decision in the eyes of law. The Court also emphasises zero tolerance for the citation or reliance on such material by both the Bar and the Bench.

Conclusion: The impugned orders were unsustainable and were set aside, with the matter restored for fresh consideration in accordance with law.

Outcome: The civil appeals were dismissed, and the cost of Rs. 5,00,000 imposed by the NCLAT was set aside.

Outcome: Special leave petition disposed of with liberty to the petitioner to request consideration of the reference by the Hon'ble Chairman of the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal.

Issues: Whether a new Interim Resolution Professional should be appointed for completion of the remaining exercise relating to execution of the conveyance deed and verification of pending home buyer claims, in view of the earlier appointee proceeding on leave.

Analysis: The existing Interim Resolution Professional was unavailable till at least the end of July 2026, which impeded compliance with the Court's earlier time-bound directions concerning registration of the apartments in consultation with the home buyers. Since claims of 71 home buyers were still pending verification, a replacement was necessary to complete the remaining exercise on behalf of the project company.

Conclusion: A new Interim Resolution Professional was appointed to complete the remaining conveyance and verification exercise, and was directed to receive the same remuneration as the earlier professionals.

Issues: Whether delay in filing and re-filing an appeal under Section 62 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 can be condoned beyond the statutory outer limit and beyond the period allowed for curing defects under the Supreme Court Rules, 2013.

Analysis: Section 62 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 prescribes a strict limitation regime, allowing an appeal within 45 days and, on sufficient cause, only a further 15-day grace period. The Court held that once the statutory window closes, the jurisdiction to condone filing delay ceases. It further held that a defective appeal under Section 62 must be cured within the 28-day period contemplated by Rule 6 of Order VIII of the Supreme Court Rules, 2013, and that re-filing delay beyond that period cannot be condoned so as to keep the appeal alive. The Court rejected the contention that re-filing delay stands on a different footing from filing delay in this statutory setting and held that Article 142 cannot be used to override the express limitation scheme.

Conclusion: Condonation of the delay in filing and re-filing was held impermissible, and the appeal was dismissed as time-barred.

Outcome: The appeal was dismissed as no substantial question of law was found to arise, and the impugned judgment was left undisturbed.

Issues: (i) Whether the letter of intent issued to the successful resolution applicant was rendered conditional by stipulations referring to pending proceedings and risk allocation, (ii) whether the forfeiture of earnest money deposit for non-acceptance of the letter of intent and failure to submit the performance guarantee was lawful, and (iii) whether the Committee of Creditors could validly reject the resolution plan and proceed to liquidation after the applicant's default.

Issue (i): Whether the letter of intent issued to the successful resolution applicant was rendered conditional by stipulations referring to pending proceedings and risk allocation.

Analysis: The stipulations in the letter of intent only recorded that the resolution process would remain subject to the outcome of pending proceedings and that liabilities relating to employee and worker claims would be borne by the successful resolution applicant in accordance with the resolution framework. The applicant had participated in the relevant Committee of Creditors meetings, was aware of the pending litigation, and expressly accepted the relevant terms. In that context, the Court found no basis to treat the letter of intent as a conditional instrument that entitled the applicant to resile from the approved plan.

Conclusion: The challenge to the letter of intent failed, and the stipulations did not make it conditional in the sense urged by the appellant.

Issue (ii): Whether the forfeiture of earnest money deposit for non-acceptance of the letter of intent and failure to submit the performance guarantee was lawful.

Analysis: Clause 1.9.4 of the Request For Resolution Plan authorized forfeiture where the successful applicant failed to submit the performance guarantee within time or otherwise failed to comply with the resolution process. The Court noted that the seven-day period for performance guarantee was consistent with the Request For Resolution Plan and that the applicant had earlier agreed to comply with that requirement. The applicant's refusal to accept the terms and subsequent resistance to the process justified invocation of the forfeiture clause.

Conclusion: The forfeiture of the earnest money deposit was held to be valid and lawful.

Issue (iii): Whether the Committee of Creditors could validly reject the resolution plan and proceed to liquidation after the applicant's default.

Analysis: The Court held that once the Committee of Creditors had approved the plan and the applicant failed to proceed in accordance with its obligations, no further modification or withdrawal at the applicant's instance was permissible. The applicant was found to have acquiesced in the terms and could not approbate and reprobate. The Court further held that Section 33 of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 permits liquidation before confirmation of a resolution plan when the Committee of Creditors so decides in exercise of its commercial wisdom, and such decision is not amenable to judicial interference absent statutory infraction.

Conclusion: The decision to reject the plan and liquidate the corporate debtor was upheld.

Final Conclusion: The appeals failed, the orders of the fora below were sustained, and the liquidation process was permitted to continue in accordance with the Code.

Ratio Decidendi: A successful resolution applicant who has knowingly accepted the terms of the resolution process cannot later resile from an approved plan by characterising agreed stipulations as conditional, and the Committee of Creditors' commercially wise decision to reject such a defaulting plan and move to liquidation is not open to judicial review except on limited statutory grounds.

Outcome: Civil appeal dismissed; no interference was called for with the impugned order.