Stopped payment to creditors following court orders: DHFL

Debt-ridden mortgage firm DHFL on Sunday said it has stopped payment to its creditors, including fixed deposit holders, following the direction of Bombay High Court.

This clarification has come a day after Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi termed the company a defaulter and slammed the UP government for investing the employee provident fund money in such a firm.

She wondered whose interest was being served by investing Rs 2,000 crore of the employees' hard-earned money in such a company.

"The Hon'ble High Court of Bombay in the case of Reliance Nippon Life Insurance v/s DHFL passed an order on September 30, 2019 and October 10, 2019 restraining the company from making payments to any of its secured/unsecured creditors, including the payments to any fixed deposit holders," DHFL said in a late evening regulatory filing.

The company continues to have strong collections and adequate liquidity to pay its fixed deposit holders, it said.

However, as a consequence of the orders and pending further directives from the Bombay High Court, the company is unable to make these payments, it added.

"The company was making all payments for maturity and interest on all fixed deposits held with the company, on their respective due dates, and there has been no delay in making any payment to any fixed deposit holders until the orders," DHFL said.

Despite liquidity crisis being faced by the company since over 13 months now, it has repaid around Rs 44,000 crore towards its debt obligations, it added.

"As the company is working with multiple classes of stakeholders, we would like to state that a debt resolution is imperative and while the legal proceedings are pending, the company is proactively and in parallel making all efforts to arrive at a resolution plan with its creditors at the earliest and end the stalemate amongst its stakeholders," it noted.