Civil court jurisdiction barred for IBC matters; parallel suit and interim protection cannot obstruct insolvency proceedings.

Where a dispute concerns proceedings and orders under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016, civil court jurisdiction is barred and the statutory insolvency fora remain the proper route for relief. A commercial suit cannot be used to challenge an NCLT order or to obstruct the insolvency process by interim protection, because the Code provides its own appellate and remedial framework. In that setting, the court held that parallel civil proceedings were not maintainable and ad-interim relief could not be granted against the insolvency process.

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Issues: Whether a commercial suit and interim relief could be maintained to challenge proceedings and orders arising under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016, in view of the statutory bar on civil court jurisdiction.

Analysis: The dispute centred on whether the civil court could entertain a suit or grant interim protection against an order passed by the National Company Law Tribunal in insolvency proceedings. The statutory scheme under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 places matters within the jurisdiction of the National Company Law Tribunal and the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal outside the purview of civil court adjudication. The existence of appellate and other remedies under the Code showed that the case was not one of absence of remedy. In that setting, the challenge to the insolvency process could not be pursued through the commercial suit, and the request for ad-interim relief also could not be granted.

Conclusion: The challenge to maintainability failed and the refusal of ad-interim relief was upheld; the appeal was against the assessee/appellant.

Final Conclusion: The statutory insolvency forum remained the proper avenue for relief, and the civil court was not to interdict proceedings falling within the Code's exclusive framework.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a matter falls within the jurisdictional scheme of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016, the civil court cannot entertain a parallel suit or grant interim protection to obstruct proceedings before the statutory insolvency fora.

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