Lay down clear deadlines: Ajay Piramal to DHFL lenders | Economic Times

Mumbai: Billionaire Ajay Piramal Monday sought clear deadlines to push banks to start voting on the resolution plans for Dewan Housing Finance (DHFL), underscoring the attractiveness of his offer to help maximise recoveries for the affected financiers to the troubled mortgage lender.In a letter marked to the central bank governor, chairman of the insurance regulator, financial services secretary and top three creditors — LIC, SBI and Union Bank of India — Piramal said that his bid is implementable and uncomplicated without regulatory glitches, and that could meet the objectives of the administrator to maximise value for the creditors.“I am now perplexed to note that a need for ‘further clarifications’ has been expressed. And in some instances, these ‘clarifications’ have started to take a commercial colour yet again. Requests for change in terms like escrow amounts, cut-off date for financial creditors’ entitlement etc are, in fact, commercial changes. In a situation where the competing bid lacks implementability, I find that we are in a cycle of repeated negotiations with ourselves,” Piramal wrote.The letter dated Monday was addressed to the RBI-appointed administrator — R Subramaniakumar, who has been running the troubled home financier along with other advisors like E&Y. The central bank had superseded the erstwhile management.ET has seen a copy of the letter, which asks “for certainty, reason and timeliness in process.” Piramal pointed out that the frequent changes and clarifications being sought do not set the right precedent in what is the first restructuring plan for a financial services company.“The competing foreign financial investor’s resolution plan is unimplementable till such time that a credible, regulatorily acceptable alternate buyer for the Insurance business emerges,” Piramal said in the letter. Adani Group too wrote a letter Monday, raising questions on foreign ownership in an insurance company.