Amazon has moved the Apex Court challenging the Delhi HC's division bench order that had vacated a stay on Kishore Biyani-led Future Group proceeding with its Rs 24,713 crore asset sale to Reliance Industries.

Amazon, in the plea, sought a stay on the March 22 order of the division bench, terming it "illegal", "random", "inequitable & unfair".

On March 22, a division bench of the High Court of Delhi had granted Future a reprieve from a March 18 single-judge order that restrained it from taking any steps to sell assets to Reliance.

Amazon has now moved the SC & challenged the March 22 order, requesting a stay till a final outcome of its earlier plea related to the deal.

“Pass an ex-parte interim order/ interim order & stay the Impugned Interim Common Order dated 22.03.2021 passed by the Hon'ble high court of Delhi …. till the issues raised herein are finally decided by this Hon'ble Court,” Amazon said in its petition filed before the Supreme Court.

It has also requested the Top Court to pass any further order, which it ”may deem fit & proper in the facts & circumstances of the present case,” Amazon's petition, a copy which was seen by the news agency, said.

Amazon & Future Retail Ltd (FRL) did not respond to e-mailed queries.

According to the plea filed by Amazon, the division bench has committed a “grave error” in passing an order in a “non-maintainable appeal”, permitting Future Group to commit further breaches of the EA (Emergency Arbitration) order.

Amazon submitted that the single judge had passed a “well-reasoned order spanning over 130 pages” & the division bench passed the interim order “in a mechanical manner” staying its operation on “the same reasons”.

“Therefore, the petitioner (Amazon) approached this Court by filing SLP(special leave petition) …,” it added.

Earlier, Amazon had moved the Supreme Court after the single judge had passed an interim order on February 2, 2021 staying the deal & the division bench had on February 8, 2021 stayed the operation of the order over the plea filed by FRL.

The Supreme Court had then issued notice over Amazon's plea giving the go-ahead to the proceedings before the Mumbai Bench of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) over the scheme of arrangement between Future & Reliance, but these entities were not to pass any order sanctioning the deal. The plea is listed on April 27 for hearing.

The Future-Reliance deal, which is contested by the global e-commerce major Amazon, has already received clearance from CCI, SEBI & bourses, & the scheme of arrangement is now awaiting the nod from NCLT & shareholders.

The scheme of arrangement entails the consolidation of Future Group's retail & wholesale assets into one entity Future Enterprises Ltd & then transferring it to Reliance Retail Ventures Ltd (RRVL) in the Rs 24,713 crore deal that was announced in August last year.

Meanwhile, the timeline for the deal to be completed has been extended by six months to September 30, 2021 by Reliance Retail.

Amazon & Future have been locked in a bitter legal tussle after the US e-commerce giant dragged Future Group to arbitration at SIAC in October last year, arguing that the latter had violated their contract by entering into the deal with rival Reliance.

Amazon had invested in Future Coupons in Aug 2019 with an option of buying into the flagship Future Retail after a period of three to 10 years.

On Oct 25, 2020, an interim order was passed in favour of Amazon with a single-judge bench of V K Rajah barring Future Retail from taking any step to dispose of or encumber its assets or issuing any securities to secure any funding from a restricted party.

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