Creditors reject Liberty House bid for Bhushan Power and Steel

The Committee of Creditors has rejected the bid of UK-based Liberty House to acquire Bhushan Power and Steel Ltd, leaving Tata Steel and JSW Steel in the race for taking over the assets of the bankrupt firm, a source said.

"Committee of creditors (COC) in a meeting today has rejected the bids of Liberty House (of the UK) because the company submitted the bids after the last date of submission date which was February 8," a source privy to the development said.

Liberty House had submitted the bid yesterday, he said.

In today's COC meeting the bids of Tata Steel and JSW Steel were disclosed and now the process as well as legal advisors evaluate them, the source said.

The detailed terms and conditions of the bids were disclosed to the lenders at the meeting, the source said.

Bhushan Power and Steel owes about Rs 450 billion to its lenders.

When contacted, Resolution Professional (RP) Mahender Kumar Khandelwal declined to comment on the developments.

The source said that while Tata Steel offered Rs 170 billion to the lenders as upfront amount and Rs 72 billion for operations of Bhushan, JSW made an offer of Rs 110 billion to the lenders and Rs 20 billion for the operations of the beleaguered power firm.

The COC will now meet on March 6 to take the process forward, including declaration of the highest bidder.

Bhushan Steel and Power was among the 12 non-performing accounts referred by the Reserve Bank of India for National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) proceedings.

The insolvency process was filed by State Bank of India (SBI), the lead bank of the consortium of lenders, in the case of Bhushan Steel while a similar plea was filed by Punjab National Bank (PNB) against Bhushan Power and Steel.