The Hindu Business Line : Metal Box sells Faridabad property to Lakhani

Metal Box India Ltd (MBIL) has sold its Faridabad property, complete with a closed factory plus land, to Lakhani India Ltd but the buyer is finding it hard to take possession of the property because of the court case. Lakhani India has already paid a sum of Rs 10.15 crore to MBIL towards the cost of acquisition, it is learnt.

The land, measuring 40,000 sq yards, was leased out to MBIL by the Union Government as early as 1959 for setting up the factory. The factory, when constructed, occupied more than 33,000 sq yards of space.

The case

Mr S.S. Negi and several others - employees of the closed Faridabad factory - filed a suit before Faridabad civil court as early as 2001 praying for maintenance of the status quo of the factory till such time the workers had been paid all their dues. The Civil Judge of Faridabad, in an order passed on May 10, 2001, had granted permanent injunction restraining the MBIL management from removing plant and machinery, fixtures and fittings and other movables from the factory premises and from alienating the immovable property until full and final payments have been made to the employees.

Hearing on July 10

The case is to come up for hearing again on July 10.

It might be noted that as per the BIFR package, which was approved by all agencies concerned including banks, financial institutions, the company management, AAIFR and Delhi High Court and which became effective from July 2001, the MBIL management is supposed to reopen the Faridabad factory, not to sell it.

The West Bengal Government too has initiated a move to stop the sale of MBIL's property in Alipore area in the city. MBIL's R&D division was located on the property.

Meanwhile, BIFR has presented a status report on MBIL to the Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion of the Union Ministry of Commerce & Industry.

The report was prepared at the insistence of the Prime Minister's Office.

Intervention sought

In January this year, Mr Pankaj Banerjee, Leader of the Opposition in the then West Bengal Assembly, in a letter to the Prime Minister, had sought his intervention to resolve the stalemate over the implementation of the BIFR package for MBIL.

The status report notes with concern that neither the MBIL management nor ICICI, the monitoring agency, has done anything worthwhile to implement the BIFR package.

The report even quotes the union source to point out that the management did not even pay the Central excise to the tune of Rs 2.15 crore despite the Supreme Court order to make the payment.

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