Delhi High Court dismisses plea to initiate action against NBCC, Shapoorji Pallonji

The Delhi High Court recently dismissed a petition to initiate action against National Building Constructions Corporation (NBCC) and Shapoorji Pallonji & Co. over allegations of corruption in work carried out for the redevelopment of the India Trade Promotion Organisation (ITPO) Complex at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi [Times Trading Corporation Vs Union of India]..Justice Neena Bansal Krishna dismissed the plea filed by an entity called Times Trading Corporation after noting that it did not contain sufficient details of the alleged corruption. "There are no details of any kind of alleged illegal corruption which have been brought forth in the contents of the Petition. Rather, it is the personal dispute of the Petitioner, to which he has tried to give the colour of public wrong," the Court observed in the November 28 ruling. .The contract for redevelopment of ITPO was awarded to NBCC which subcontracted the work to Shapoorji Pallonji. Shapoorji Pallonji later floated tenders for the demolition of the existing structure at the work site. It awarded contracts for the demolition and sale of building materials to various parties, including one BS Enterprises, which defaulted in carrying out its obligations. This led to the works contract being awarded to the petitioner, Times Trading Corporation, in December 2017.Times Trading later alleged that after paying ₹4 crore for the contract, their workers faced obstacles created by Shapoorji. It further alleged that portion of their work was reassigned to another company, M/s Green Life Infrastructure Development Corporation, in January 2018 for ₹1.8 crore. Times Trading claimed this was illegal, as the items included in their original contract were resold. .Times Trading, therefore, lodged complaints with the police and ITPO management, alleging fraud and misconduct. Shapoorji eventually agreed to a settlement in March 2018 for ₹6.02 crore. Following this, Times Trading withdrew its complaints. However, Times Trading later alleged that the settlement was based on fraudulent claims. It claimed that Shapoorji did not pay the settlement amount despite multiple follow ups. Shapoorji Pallonji clarified that the scope of the work awarded to Times Trading was limited to building materials and did not include dismantling an AC plant or other equipment, which was included in another contract. Shapoorji also alleged that Times Trading failed to complete their work on time and caused delays at the project site..The Court found that Shapoorji had sufficiently explained that there was no double allotment of work to M/s Green Life, contrary to the petitioner's claim.It noted that the remaining grievance of Times Trading was the alleged non-implementation of the 2018 settlement agreement. The Court concluded that Times Trading's dispute arose primarily from civil contracts entered into with Shapoorji Pallonji. Thus, the Court found merit in the arguments of the respondents (NBCC and Shapoorji) that these were civil disputes involving mixed questions of fact and law, which cannot be a subject matter of a writ petition. The Court also dismissed the petitioner's claim that a writ petition was maintainable in this case since it is related to a project undertaking by the Union of India. “Merely because it was a project undertaken by Union of India, would not make it a subject matter of Writ, essentially because the dispute is between Respondent No.7 (Shapoorji Pallonji) and Petitioner with no involvement of the Union of India," the Court said. .The Court added that if the petitioner has any grievance that the police was not taking adequate steps on its complaints of cheating and fraud, it should have approached a criminal court instead of filing a writ petition. “The grievance in regard to non-registration of FIR can be agitated by the Petitioner before the Criminal Court of competent jurisdiction. The Petitioner having failed to resort to the appropriate machinery, cannot come directly seeking directions from the Court under the Writ jurisdiction," the Court said. Thus, having found no merit to invoke its writ jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution, the court dismissed the writ petition. .The petitioner was represented by Senior Advocate Harshvir Pratap Sharma and advocates Atul Krishnan, Amit Kumar, Stuti Jain and Akshu Jain.Advocates GG Kashyap, Ronvijay, Nishant Pandit and Soumya Singh appeared for the ITPO and the NBCC.Shapoorji Pallonji was represented by advocates Madhav Khurrana, Jaiyesh Bakshi, Ravi Tyagi, Mayank Mishra, Chirag Sharma, Manmilan Sidhu, Ria Chandra, Bhumika Bhatnagar, Sudiksha Saini, Saksha Jha and Shikhar Misra..[Read Judgment]