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l) The Respondent strongly opposed the aforesaid application before the Supreme Court, to resist the withdrawal of the Special Leave Petition and indeed, the revocation of the bank guarantee. The basis of the Respondent's opposition was that Section 14 of the IBC only prohibits proceedings against a corporate November 13, 2024 Shraddha IAL-31055-2024 APP-597-2016-J - November 13, 2024.doc debtor and has no implication whatsoever for proceedings filed by the corporate debtor. It was argued that it is the corporate debtor that has filed the present Appeal against the Impugned Judgement, and the petition in the Supreme Court against an order passed in the course of the present Appeal. The argument of the Respondent was that the bank guarantee and the amount covered by it are in a nature of "custodia legis" and the Appellant has no control over the same, which, according to the Respondent, meant that the bank guarantee is not an asset of the corporate debtor;

n) Upon hearing the parties, the Supreme Court allowed Interim Application No. 7569 of 2024 seeking withdrawal of the Special Leave Petition and permitted the revocation of the ICICI Guarantee. The Supreme Court made the following Order:

I.A. No. 7569/2024, seeking withdrawal of the special leave petition, is allowed. The special leave petition is dismissed as withdrawn.
The bank guarantee(s) will stand revoked.

10. Pursuant to the aforesaid contention, since the order of the Supreme Court permitting revocation of the ICICI Guarantee was not very detailed, but was a disposal of the pleadings made before the Supreme Court, we called upon the parties to produce before us the pleadings in the Supreme Court.

Findings and Analysis:

11. It is from the record so produced, that the aforesaid factual matrix has been extracted. It is clear from a plain reading of the pleadings of the parties before the Supreme Court, and the outcome of permitting the revocation of the ICICI Guarantee, that the implications of the insolvency proceedings on the security interest created in the course of this Appeal, have been decided by the Supreme Court, and that too, inter-parties, taking into account the very contentions that are now raised before this Court.

16. The order of the Supreme Court permitting revocation of the ICICI Guarantee constituting the very same security interest, relates to the very same CIRP and the disputes between the very same parties. Therefore, the decision of the Supreme Court would require disposal of this Application (for withdrawal of the cash deposited in this Court too). However, since the Respondent has submitted that Rajendra Bansal presents an absolute proposition of law, namely, that monies deposited in court do not belong to the corporate debtor, although the decision of the Supreme Court inter-parties should put an end to any further controversy, we believe it would be necessary to discuss and deal with the Respondent's contention.