Resolution professional may keep a contingent claim in abeyance pending arbitration and uncertain set-off issues.

Under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, a resolution professional's role is to collect, verify and collate claims, and to make a best estimate where the amount is uncertain. Where the claimant's entitlement may be affected by pending arbitration and a possible set-off on the corporate debtor's counterclaim, keeping the claim in abeyance can be a permissible administrative course. The professional is not required to adjudicate disputed quantum before acting. Immediate admission of the claim was therefore refused, and the abeyance decision was sustained in the stated circumstances.

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Issues: Whether the resolution professional could keep the appellant's claim in abeyance and decline its admission pending arbitration proceedings and determination of the corporate debtor's counterclaim.

Analysis: Under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, the resolution professional is required to collect, verify and collate claims, and the regulations permit him to make a best estimate where the amount claimed is not precise due to contingency or other reasons. The statutory role is administrative rather than adjudicatory. In the present case, the claim arose in a setting where arbitration over the counterclaim was pending, and the quantum payable to the appellant could be affected by possible set-off. On that footing, keeping the claim in abeyance until greater certainty emerged was treated as a permissible course in the circumstances.

Conclusion: The request to direct immediate admission of the appellant's claim was rejected, and the resolution professional's decision to keep the claim in abeyance was upheld.

Ratio Decidendi: A resolution professional may, in appropriate circumstances, keep a claim in abeyance where its quantum is contingent on pending proceedings and remains uncertain, since the professional's function is to collate and estimate claims rather than adjudicate them.

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