On 24 February 2026, the Supreme Court restored a ₹600 crore Section 7 IBC petition, holding that informal restructuring with one debenture holder cannot defeat a debenture-trustee application that did not follow the Debenture Trust Deed's amendment procedure.
On 22 January 2026, a two-judge bench held that section 60(5)(c) IBC does not empower the NCLT to declare title in a disputed trademark when the approved resolution plan itself flags rival claims; trademark adjudication must be left to the competent civil court.
On 9 April 2026, the Supreme Court restated the Mobilox Innovations discipline: in a Section 9 IBC application the Adjudicating Authority enquires only into the existence of a plausible pre-existing dispute, not its merits; NCLAT cannot conduct a mini-trial to test the defence.
NCLAT Principal Bench (Bhushan CP, Mitra and Baroka) holds that where a Technical Guidance Agreement itself creates a minimum-royalty obligation, the absence of invoices does not defeat a Section 9 application; ₹63 lakh deposit ordered failing which CIRP admission follows.
On 24 February 2026, the Supreme Court held that a stale and procedurally defective Scheme of Arrangement under Sections 391–394 of the Companies Act 1956 cannot defeat a Section 7 IBC application; Section 238 IBC override extends to defunct schemes; a 28-year corporate dispute reaches doctrinal resolution.
On 27 May 2026, a two-judge bench held that once the Committee of Creditors approves a resolution plan, the Successful Resolution Applicant cannot renegotiate its terms — to permit otherwise would cause the architecture of the IBC to crumble.
Valkya Editorial··8 min
Landmark JudgmentNational Company Law Appellate Tribunal, Principal Bench, New Delhi
NCLAT held on 9 February 2026 that a contested endorsement-fee instalment, plausibly linked to actual service-days, gives rise at most to a damages claim, not to operational debt under s.5(21) IBC; CIRP cannot be a recovery forum.
A 2-judge bench of the Supreme Court — *S.B. Sinha, J.* and *P.K. Balasubramanyan, J.* — held in April 2006 that *Section 529-A* of the *Companies Act 1956* created a *pari-passu* charge between workmen's dues and secured creditors as a class, but did not abolish inter-se priorities among secured creditors. Where Parliament has not expressly displaced the rule, *Section 48* of the *Transfer of Property Act 1882* applies — the first-created charge prevails over the second. The decision is not, strictly, a SARFAESI judgment; it is a Companies Act and TPA judgment whose inter-creditor reasoning has since been read into consortium-lending architecture, second-charge enforcement and — in academic commentary — into the *Section 53* IBC waterfall.
On 3 February 2026, a two-judge bench upheld a joint Section 7 CIRP against two intrinsically linked Bhasin entities running the Grand Venezia project, formally endorsing group insolvency at the apex level.
In February 2026, the Supreme Court held that telecom spectrum is a sovereign resource held in public trust and cannot be subjected to IBC proceedings or the section 14 moratorium.
On 5 May 2026 a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court, in Alpha Corp Development Pvt Ltd v. Greater Noida Industrial Development Authority, authorised the lifting of the corporate veil during the CIRP of a holding company so that the land assets held by its SPV subsidiaries — which had been used by the group to shield real-estate landbanks from homebuyer claims — could be drawn into the resolution estate. Decided on the factual matrix of the Earth Infrastructures group and producing relief for over 4,200 homebuyers, the ruling is the first clear apex pronouncement that the corporate-separateness principle can be lifted in real-estate insolvencies where the multi-SPV structure has been used to defeat the substantive resolution objective. A close reading of the bench's reasoning, the Article 142 architecture, and what the ruling means for SPV-structured developers, homebuyer associations, and the 2026 RERA-IBC recalibration.
On 15 November 2019 a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court delivered the most consequential IBC judgment of the post-*Swiss Ribbons* era. The Bench held that the Committee of Creditors' commercial wisdom on the distribution of resolution-plan proceeds — including unequal treatment of financial and operational creditors — is paramount; that the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal had erred in directing equal pro-rata distribution; that the *Section 53* waterfall is a guide but the CoC retains discretion subject to the *Section 30(2)(b)* minimum-liquidation-value floor; that the 'mandatorily' in the amended *Section 12* 330-day proviso is to be read down as directory in exceptional cases; and that the resolution applicant takes the corporate debtor on a 'clean slate' — claims not in the plan stand extinguished.
On 27 November 2019, a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court — Rohinton Fali Nariman, J. (authoring), Surya Kant, J. and V. Ramasubramanian, J. — struck down Section 87 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act 1996 (inserted by the 2019 Amendment) as manifestly arbitrary and violative of Article 14. The decision restored the no-automatic-stay regime built by the 2015 amendments and confirmed by BCCI v. Kochi Cricket (2018): a Section 34 challenge does not, of itself, stay the enforcement of an arbitral award; the award-debtor must apply separately for a stay under Section 36(3). A close reading of the architecture, the legislative-reversal pattern that brought Section 87 into being, the manifest-arbitrariness reasoning, and the practitioner discipline now stable on independent stay applications.
The May 2026 cycle in Indian insolvency law has produced three threads running in parallel — the IBBI omnibus 19 May 2026 cluster amending the CIRP, Liquidation Process and PPIRP Regulations on a single day; the May 2026 operational implementation of the IBC (Amendment) Act 2026, including the new s.12A withdrawal architecture, the 14-day admission discipline, the new Chapter IV-A creditor-initiated insolvency resolution process, the 2-year avoidance look-back and the abolition of the fast-track CIRP; and the Supreme Court's real-estate course-correction in Alpha Corp v. GNIDA, the Dhanlaxmi Bank v. Mohd. Javed Sultan IBC-as-coercive-recovery line, the e-filing-without-certified-copy discipline under s.61(2), and the NCLAT's Purusottam Behera v. SBI reading on PIRP duration. Read together, the cycle discloses the operational architecture in which Indian insolvency practice now operates.
The Supreme Court's first substantive ruling on the architecture of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code 2016. A 2-judge bench held that the IBC, enacted under Entry 9 of List III, prevails over inconsistent State moratoria through *Section 238* read with Article 254; the *Section 7* admission enquiry is narrow — confined to whether a financial debt and default exist — and once those facts are made out the National Company Law Tribunal must admit, with no residual 'I deem fit' discretion. The decision framed the post-2016 'paradigm shift' away from debtor-in-possession, was diluted by *Vidarbha* in 2022, and was substantially restored by *M. Suresh Kumar Reddy* in 2023.
On 5 February 2019 a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court held that the Committee of Creditors' commercial wisdom in approving or rejecting a resolution plan by the requisite voting majority is non-justiciable. The National Company Law Tribunal's judicial review under *Section 31* is confined to *Section 30(2)* compliance — it cannot second-guess the CoC's commercial judgment. On rejection of all plans by the CoC, the Adjudicating Authority is obliged to initiate liquidation under *Section 33(1)*. The decision is the foundational articulation of the commercial-wisdom doctrine that organises post-2019 IBC jurisprudence.
On 30 May 2022 a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court, in Kotak Mahindra Bank Ltd v. A. Balakrishnan, held that the liability arising from a Recovery Certificate issued by a Debts Recovery Tribunal under Section 19 of the RDDBFI Act is a 'financial debt' within the meaning of Section 5(8) of the IBC, that the holder of such a Certificate is a 'financial creditor' under Section 5(7) entitled to file a Section 7 application, and — most consequentially for limitation practice — that the Certificate creates a fresh cause of action so that limitation under Article 137 of the Limitation Act runs from the date of its issuance, not from the date of the original default. A close reading of the bench's reasoning, its extension of the Dena Bank v. C. Shivakumar Reddy line, and what the ruling has come to mean for banks, ARCs and corporate debtors at the s.7 admission stage.
On 21 May 2021 a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court, in Lalit Kumar Jain v. Union of India, upheld the Central Government's MCA Notification of 15 November 2019 selectively bringing Part III of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code into force for personal guarantors of corporate debtors as valid conditional legislation, and held that approval of a resolution plan for a corporate debtor under Section 31 does not, of itself, discharge a personal guarantor — surety liability rests on the independent footing of Section 128 of the Contract Act. A close reading of the judgment authored by Justice Ravindra Bhat, the doctrinal architecture of the Section 60(2) common-forum design, and the doctrinal arc through Dilip B. Jiwrajka.
On 19 January 2021 a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court — Justices Rohinton Nariman, Navin Sinha and K.M. Joseph — upheld the constitutional validity of the IBC (Amendment) Act 2020 which inserted the second proviso to Section 7(1) requiring real-estate allottees to file jointly with a minimum of 100 allottees of the same project or 10 per cent of the total allottees (whichever is less). The bench held the threshold a reasonable Article 14 classification, treated the Article 19(1)(g) and Article 21 challenges as not made out (Article 21 expressly because alternative RERA and Consumer Protection Act remedies remained available), preserved the homebuyer-as-financial-creditor status validated in Pioneer Urban (2019), and exercised Article 142 to grant a 30-day window to pending applicants to align their pleadings with the new threshold. A close reading of Justice Nariman's judgment and what the threshold means for the present practitioner advising on a real-estate Section 7 application.
On 1 February 2021 a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court, in Phoenix ARC (P) Ltd v. Spade Financial Services Ltd, supplied the definitive Indian statement of the substantive content of financial debt — disbursement, consideration for the time value of money, and the commercial-effect-of-borrowing test — and held that collusive or sham transactions structured to mimic loans do not give rise to financial-creditor status. The judgment also extended the related-party exclusion in the first proviso to Section 21(2) to entities that were related to the corporate debtor at the time the debt was incurred but had since formally divested, rejecting a mechanical 'praesenti' reading. A close reading of Justice Chandrachud's judgment, the doctrinal architecture, and the post-Phoenix practice.
On 9 August 2019 a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court, in Pioneer Urban Land and Infrastructure Ltd v. Union of India, upheld the 2018 Amendment to the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code that deemed homebuyer advances 'commercial effect of borrowing' and thereby financial debt under Section 5(8)(f), held that IBC and RERA operate in different fields and co-exist harmoniously with Section 238 IBC controlling on conflict, and drew the doctrinal line between genuine allottees with possession intent and speculative investors seeking only refund or profit. A close reading of Justice Nariman's judgment, the constitutional analysis on Articles 14, 19(1)(g) and 300A, the field-occupation reasoning and what practitioners advising developers and homebuyers should take from the case.
Read through the coordination lens rather than the constitutional-validity lens, Pioneer Urban v. Union of India is the case that built the structural relationship between RERA and the IBC. The three-judge bench held that the two statutes occupy different fields, that Section 88 RERA preserves remedies under other laws additively, that the Section 238 IBC non-obstante clause is engaged only on an actual operational conflict, and that the same homebuyer can simultaneously stand as RERA allottee, CPA consumer and IBC financial creditor. The genuine-allottee/speculative-investor distinction is the IBC's internal abuse-prevention valve, examined at the Section 7 admission stage and reinforced by the Section 65 discipline. This editorial draws the textual map, the field-occupation analysis and the downstream architecture leading to Manish Kumar (2021) and the project-wise CIRP codified by the IBC (Amendment) Act 2026.
The May–June 2026 cycle in Indian real-estate regulation has produced the most consequential cluster of doctrinal and operational interventions since the RERA architecture was fully operationalised through 2017–18. The MoHUA's notification of the Jan Vishwas-driven Section 68 RERA decriminalisation, the MahaRERA's closure of the legacy portal and migration to MahaCRITI, the Supreme Court's pointed obiter on RERA's operational performance, the operational implementation of the IBC (Amendment) Act 2026's project-wise CIRP architecture, the K-REAT ruling holding Bengaluru Development Authority a 'promoter' under Section 2(zk) RERA, the K-RERA's substantive compensation awards, the NCLAT and Supreme Court reaffirmation of the speculative-vs-genuine allottee distinction, the ED's ₹2,426-crore homebuyer-funds investigation and the broader litigation-trend synthesis — read together they reset the operational architecture in which RERA practice now runs.
On 6 September 2022 a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court, in State Tax Officer (1) v. Rainbow Papers Ltd, read Section 48 of the Gujarat Value Added Tax Act 2003 — which creates a first charge on the dealer's property in respect of VAT dues — as creating a 'security interest' by operation of law within Section 3(31) of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, with the consequence that the State became a 'secured creditor' under Section 3(30) and a resolution plan that wholly ignored the statutory dues was non-compliant with Section 30(2). A coordinate bench in Paschimanchal Vidyut Vitran Nigam v. Raman Ispat then confined the holding to its facts. A close reading of the GVAT-IBC architecture, the Section 53 waterfall analysis, the doctrinal arc that has followed, and what practitioners advising resolution applicants and statutory authorities should take from the case.
On 26 August 2022 a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court, in Sundaresh Bhatt, Liquidator of ABG Shipyard v. Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs, held that once a moratorium is imposed under Section 14 or Section 33(5) of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, the Customs Act yields to the IBC by force of Section 238. The Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs retains the power to assess and determine the quantum of customs duty payable, but cannot initiate recovery, sale or confiscation of the corporate debtor's goods during the moratorium; the customs claim must be filed before the IRP or liquidator and ranks in the Section 53 waterfall. A close reading of Chief Justice Ramana's judgment, the spheres-of-operation reasoning and the doctrinal arc through Paschimanchal.
On 25 January 2019 a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court upheld the *Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code 2016* in its entirety against a battery of Article 14, Article 19(1)(g) and Article 300A challenges. The judgment installed an intelligible-differentia rationale for the financial-creditor / operational-creditor distinction, read down *Section 29A* to confine its sweep to specified categories of ineligible resolution applicants, and directed practical fixes to the *NCLT / NCLAT* tribunal architecture including circuit benches. The 'defaulter's paradise is lost' framing has organised the post-2019 narrative on the Code's transformative purpose.
On 12 July 2022 a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court, in Vidarbha Industries Power Ltd v. Axis Bank Ltd, read the word 'may' in Section 7(5)(a) of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code as conferring discretion on the adjudicating authority to refuse admission of an otherwise-eligible Section 7 application — an apparent dilution of the Innoventive 'mandatory-admission-on-proof-of-debt-and-default' rule. The reception was sharp; the review was dismissed; a coordinate bench in Maganlal Daga flagged the inconsistency; and a coordinate bench in M. Suresh Kumar Reddy v. Canara Bank confined Vidarbha to its facts. A close reading of the textual contrast between Sections 7(5)(a) and 9(5)(a), the APTEL-award factual matrix, and the doctrinal arc that has, in operational terms, restored Innoventive to its place.
A practitioner-oriented synthesis of the IBC dispositions that have shaped the first half of 2026 — Elegna's reaffirmation of the mandatory-admission threshold, Embassy Developments' clean reversal at the NCLAT Principal Bench, Gokul Aggarwal on the limits of Section 12A withdrawal post-liquidation, Kejriwal on the personal-guarantor invocation question, the Sunil Kumar Jain order on EPFO assessment within the Section 14 moratorium, and the KLSR Infratech costs order. The piece reads them as a coherent doctrinal map of where insolvency law in India stands at mid-2026.
On 15 January 2026, a Supreme Court bench of Justices J.B. Pardiwala and R. Mahadevan held in Elegna Co-operative Housing Society v. Edelweiss ARC that once a financial debt and default are established, admission under Section 7 of the IBC is mandatory — viability, prejudice to homebuyers, and creditor motive are wholly extraneous. A digest of the disposition, the doctrinal lineage from Innoventive through Vidarbha to M. Suresh Kumar Reddy, and what the homebuyer locus question looks like after Elegna and the companion Mansi Brar Fernandes line.
Valkya Editorial··8 min
Landmark JudgmentNational Company Law Appellate Tribunal, Principal Bench, New Delhi
On 4 May 2026, the NCLAT Principal Bench set aside an NCLT order from December 2025 that had admitted Embassy Developments Limited into CIRP — and closed the insolvency proceedings in their entirety. A digest of the disposal, the institutional posture it signals, and what it means for promoters fighting Section 7 / Section 9 admission at the threshold.
A clean NCLAT ruling on a question that had been quietly bedeviling resolution professionals across the country: can the EPFO continue assessment proceedings during a moratorium under Section 14 of the IBC? The Tribunal has held that it cannot — and that an assessment order passed during CIRP is, accordingly, unenforceable against the corporate debtor.
Valkya Editorial··8 min
Landmark JudgmentNational Company Law Appellate Tribunal, Principal Bench, New Delhi
After a judicial member of the NCLAT Chennai bench recused himself in August 2025 — disclosing an attempt to influence the order through a former High Court judge — the matter went to the Principal Bench under the Supreme Court's directions. On 23 March 2026, the Principal Bench under Chairperson Ashok Bhushan, J. set aside the insolvency proceedings and imposed ₹10 lakh costs on the operational creditor. A short but consequential disposition.
The withdrawal mechanism under Section 12A of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code was Parliament's compromise between commercial pragmatism and statutory discipline — a structured route for settlement during CIRP. The NCLAT has, in a line of 2026 decisions including Gokul Aggarwal v. Bank of India, held that the route closes when liquidation commences. A digest of the doctrinal architecture, the line of cases, and what it means for the settlement-exit practice that had grown up around the section.
Valkya Editorial··10 min
Landmark JudgmentNational Company Law Appellate Tribunal, Principal Bench, New Delhi
The NCLAT has held that the demand notice in Form B prescribed under the 2019 Rules cannot, by itself, constitute invocation of a personal guarantee. A Section 95 IBC application against a personal guarantor without prior contractual invocation is not maintainable. The NCLAT went further: it directed that the conduct of UCO Bank officials in filing the application without invocation be brought to the attention of the bank's Chairman. A digest of the doctrinal point, the procedural architecture, and what it means for personal-guarantor practice.