Oberoi Hotel Group Family Property Dispute: Delhi HC Restrains EIH, Oberoi Hotels And Oberoi Properties From Transferring Any Shares
|The Delhi High Court protected Anastasia Obeori and her mother by restraining EIH, Oberoi Hotels and Oberoi Properties from transferring any shares held by Late PRS Oberoi.
The Court was hearing the Oberoi family dispute when Anastasia Oberoi, daughter of the hotelier late Prithviraj Singh Oberoi approached the Delhi High Court along with her mother against her step-siblings and her Cousin.
The bench of Justice Navin Chawla observed, “the interest of justice and the interest of plaintiffs can be protected by restraining the defendant nos.1 to 3, and defendant nos.4, 7 and 8 from transferring or transmitting any shares in defendant no.4, defendant no. 7, and/or defendant no. 8 held by the Testator, except one Class-A share in defendant nos. 7 and 8 each to the defendant no.1.”
Senior Advocates Sandeep Sethi, Arun Kathpalia and Jayant Mehta appeared for the Plaintiffs and Senior Advocates Neeraj Kishan Kaul, Amit Sibal and Rajiv Nayar appeared for the Defendants.
Brief Facts-
Anastasia Oberoi and her mother claimed 1600 A Class shares and 62,075 B Class shares of Oberoi Hotels, 100 A class shares and 2600 B class shares of Oberoi properties, 46% capital contribution in Aravali Polymers, 12-acre villa in Delhi along with land parcels in Gurugram and 50% PRS Oberoi’s assets which may be “discovered later”. Defendants challenged the 2021 cited by Anastasia and went on to cite a 1992 Will signed by PRS Oberoi’s father MS Oberoi.
The Court said that there is sufficient material placed on record by the Plaintiffs to demonstrate the prima facie reliability of the Will and the Codicil of the Testator propounded by them.
While noting that the plaintiffs have been able to make out a good prima facie case in their favour the Court said, “The balance of convenience is also in favour of the plaintiffs and against the defendants. The plaintiffs are likely to suffer grave irreparable harm in case the subject matter of the Suit, that is the shares and properties, are alienated during the pendency of the Suit and before the defendants file their response and the same is considered by this Court.”
The Court also restrained defendants from interfering with the possession and enjoyment of Plaintiffs of land and building situated at Khasra no.160/4 located in the Village of Bijwasan, Kapashera, Delhi.
The Court however, said that the all the observations are only prima facie in nature and have been made for the purposes of passing the present ad interim Order.
Cause Title: Anastasia Mirjana Jojic Oberoi & Ors. v. Rajaraman Shankar & Ors.
Appearance:
Appellant: Sr. Adv. Sandeep Sethi, Sr. Adv. Arun Kathpalia, Sr. Adv. Jayant Mehta, Adv. Swapnil Gupta, Adv. Shivambika Sinha, Adv. Nimita Kaur, Adv. U.Banerjee, Adv. Aadil Singh Boparai, Adv. Srishti Khanna, Adv. Saurabh Dev Karan Singh, Adv. Gurveer Lally, Adv. Abhinav Mishra, Adv. Vaibhav Mendiratt, Adv. Srishti Khanna, Adv. Saurabh Dev Karan Singh, Adv. Abhimanyu Arun Walia and Adv. Abhishek Dubey
Respondent: Sr. Adv. Neeraj Kishan Kaul, Sr. Adv. Amit Sibal, Sr. Adv. Rajiv Nayar, Adv. Shankh Sengupta, Adv. Ribi V.Garg, Adv. Shreyash Sharma, Adv. Aseem Chaturvedi, Adv. Aakash Bajaj, Adv. Shivank Diddi and Adv. Preorna Banerjee, Adv. Sania Abbasi and Adv. Aman Gupta