The Bombay high court
on Tuesday granted an interim injunction against Zee Entertainment Enterprise
Ltd's (ZEEL) largest shareholder Invesco, restraining the latter from going
ahead with the requisition of an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) seeking
removal of the ZEEL MD and CEO Punit Goenka.
A single bench presided
over by Justice Gautam Patel said, “I have granted an injunction to the
respondents."
A detailed
order of the court is awaited.
The high court had reserved
its order on the issue last week after ZEEL had told the court that it was not
willing to hold an EGM of shareholders as requested by its largest shareholder,
Invesco.
The submission
was made in response to a previous suggestion made by the Bombay HC whereby, Justice
Patel had asked the ZEEL if it was willing to hold such a meeting.
Senior counsel Gopal
Subramanium, who appeared for ZEEL, had told the HC at the time that the
company's Board of Directors could not grant permission for something that
could turn out to be “illegal."
Invesco
Developing Markets Fund and OFI Global China Fund, the largest investors of
ZEEL, had sent a requisition to the company on September 11 to call for an EGM
for the removal of MD and CEO Punit Goenka and two other non-independent and
non-executive directors from the company's board.
It had also sought the
induction of six new independent directors.
ZEEL, however, moved the HC
on October 2, seeking that the court declares the requisition notice for a
shareholders meeting sent by Invesco as illegal and invalid.