For clarification they have not been found gullty of anything at this stage and may well not be. They are currently under investigation and any freezing of assets is to protect the authorities during the investigation. If they aren't found to be in breach of any regulations then the said property will have the restriction removed. When they say siezed they don't actually take the property away from them, a charge or restriction will be placed on the property which prevents them from selling, transferring or raising capital against the asset. Also, note that this not a criminal investigation.

£3.7m a couple of weeks ago from VHPL to Venkateshwara London Ltd as per the link in my previous post. Otherwise nothing.

Interestingly the date for the ED to reply to the court petition made on 23/09/24 was by 21/10/24. On the 14/10/24 Venkateshwara Hatcheries PVT Ltd, which is the company under investigation in India and Venkys main holding company that provides investment and remittances to its subsidiaries injected a further £3.7m via share capital into Venkateshwara London Limited, which is the company they set up to purchase and now owns the training complex. Link below: https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/13452736/filing-history To me it would seem more than a coincidence that they have issued £3.7m of funding via share capital three weeks after making that submission to the court. The last issue of share capital was 12 months ago but was funded by a secured loan from Crossbaron - as you can see the charge is registered just before the issue of the share capital. However this time, no new charge or amendment to the existing charge has been filed. Now it is possible that the original charge allowed for further cash advances in the future, but I think that given the notice filed to the court on 23/09/24 followed by the injection of share capital some 3 weeks later may mean that something in India has changed.

No not really, other than any potential dividend paid by the PLC to VHPL could technically be re-invested in VLL

The 51% is just their holding in Venkys India PLC Rev, it’s held by VHPL and I believe that figure to be accurate.

Sorry it’s taken a while, BH weekend etc. Not much more to divulge really. My colleagues have come back and stick by their original legal interpretation of the court hearing on 31/10/23 in that VHPL are not restricted on sending future funds to VLL as long as they comply with the criteria set out by the court at that hearing. This aligns with the latest club statement but they do concur that the entry in the last set of club accounts seems to contradict this. Sorry this doesn’t really make things much clearer.

Thats Venkys India, which is a PLC listed on the Indian Stock Exchange and is nothing to do with Rovers. The only thing in common is that VHPL is the holding company for the 51% share holding in Venkys India (maintaining a majority holding whilst the remaining 49% are traded on the stock exchange) and is also for the holding company for VLL and in turn BRFC. VHPL also owns / has holdings in numerous other entities across the world.

The judge that was supposed to hear the VHPL Petition is required to sit on a larger bench for another case and therefore is unable to hear the VHPL case.

As I stated previously the above are not my views. My background is corporate finance and the views above are that of two of my colleagues who work in our legal team, both who are qualified solicitors specialising in corporate financial law. What I have posted is their interpretation of the court order from a legal point of view. I’ll pass your comments on to them and see what they say, might not be a quick response as I’m running out of ‘favours’ with them. The issue with this is most of it is pure speculation based upon extremely limited factual information and people are putting two and two together and coming up with 150 in some scenarios. Hence why I’ve refrained from posting.

I have received further information regarding the bond / guarantee. Summary is below: The order made on 31.10.23 clearly states an unconditional bank guarantee is to be made in favour of the ED for the same amount being remitted. A bank guarantee in this situation usually means that the bank guarantee to pay the amount set out in the terms in the event that the petitioner defaults / refuses to pay any amount due up to this value. This would only be called upon if VHPL is found to be in breach of FEMA and a subsequent financial penalty / fine relating to this is not paid. It is worth noting that for the bank to agree to any such guarantee the standing of VHPL with the bank must be A+++ and they would have very large amounts invested / deposited with said bank. I’m not going to get into commenting on the case or the financial position of VHPL, other than publicly available ratings agency documents state that the VHPL Group has huge cash reserves. On a side note, looking at the case history I would make an assumption that the purpose of the hearing is not urgent in the short term. As can be seen in 2023, documents show that when the situation was perilous the hearings were being scheduled and re-scheduled only days apart.

Let me ask the question - I’ll post back as soon as hear from them

The ED is the Enforcement Directorate - this is who is pursuing the case against VHPL

I’ve not posted much in relation to this. My background is corporate finance which means I have some legal understanding of these kind of cases but I’m by no means and expert and certainly not in Indian case law. I asked a couple of colleagues who are legally qualified to look at the order that was made on 31.10.2023 and give their view on it. Again, their first response was they’re not experienced with Indian Law but they have given their view based on their expertise in general and I’ve summarised this below: The order made on 31.10.23 would appear to confirm that no further approval is required from the court for the future remittance of funds to VLL provided that the terms of the order are met, namely that a bank guarantee in favour for the ED is given for the full amount being remitted, that a break down of the use of funds is provided to the ED, that signed statement confirming the use of the funds is provided by BRFC auditors and that bank statements for both VLL and BRFC are submitted to the ED showing receipt of said funds. As long as VHPL comply with these steps there is no restriction on sending money to VLL / BRFC. The subsequent court hearings have been petitioned by VHPL and the respondent is the ED. In layman’s terms this means it is VHPL who are taking the ED to court in this instance not the other way around as some people on here seem to think. The view is that the purpose of this would be to get some kind of amendment made to the order, possibly removing the need for the bank guarantee or one of the other pre-requisites. This would suggest that VHPL believe that some element of the investigation has changed and any such change is in their favour as they would need to submit evidence to substantiate any such change request. That’s pretty much it as it stands and is only a view from their perspective based upon the information available. In terms of the ED’s ongoing investigation into VHPL they aren’t able to comment as none of the details relating to this are in the public domain.

Thats the whole point, you can’t put out a statement of fact unless it is fact. If someone told you it was highly likely that something was going to go in your favour and would you then go and state publicly that it has gone in your favour? As much as I hate these clowns and what they’ve done to our club in this instance there is nothing else the statement could have said.

There’s absolutely no way anyone with an ounce of business acumen would categorically guarantee anything that is reliant on a third party. Hence the use of the word should which is entirely appropriate in this situation. The big factor we need to consider here is that the court case now only revolves around technical and procedural issues which would strongly hint that it is due to be resolved without severe repercussions or impact on their business. This is also backed up by the fact that court have listed this for a final hearing in August. it’s not the news that most of us wanted but it looks like we are stuck with them for the foreseeable.

This company, Venkys Overseas Ltd is a company registered in Jersey and this is just the date the company was added to CH here for compliance. The company was actually incorporated in May 2011.

As per my previous post the precedent has now been set and that is what will be used for any future ruling unless any of the circumstances or facts regarding the investigation into VHPL change (in particular in relation to remittances made to VLL or BRFC). As Glen has posted the cash flow problems at the time were well documented although denied by SW. It’s worth noting that HMRC use the threat of winding up orders all the time as part of their debt recovery process. It would seem that BRFC had an “arrangement to pay” in place on which they didn’t deliver. In this situation the full amount outstanding will usually then become due immediately. The fact here is no winding up order was made, in fact one was never even applied for through the courts let alone granted and the amount was settled in full. Whilst less than ideal this kind of thing goes on all the time. I agree that going to court every few months is less than ideal and ultimately unsustainable in the long term (land very costly). However, this investigation and the associated restrictions from the Indian Authorities will at some point be concluded and come to an end. Despite our feelings toward them I wouldn’t under estimate Venkys power, both financially and legally.

It’s one of the research companies, I’ll post which one on Monday as which actual group company it was escapes me (and trust me, there are a lot). In the meantime this document is publicly available and should be some interesting reading: https://www.careratings.com/upload/CompanyFiles/PR/22112022071856_Venkateshwara_Hatcheries_Private_Limited.pdf

That’s correct. The precedent relates to the decision on whether or not funds can be released and not any pre-requisite information required to support the application. So if they do exactly as they did at the last hearing then it’s highly likely the ruling will go in their favour. If however, for example they added a further say £5m to the application for transfer funds then no precedent would exist for that scenario. @tomphil I see your point that in a normal situation this would neither be acceptable or sustainable. However, this is Venkys. We already know they’ve spent huge sums of money on legal fees just to get this to the High Court and in addition to that remember as well as the two court orders made for circa £3.5m and £11m of funding it is actually technically costing them double those amounts as they are giving bankers guarantees for the same amount to the Indian Authorities. It seems crazy but when you think they’ve thrown over £200m into Rovers for absolutely no return you realise the sums of money available to them. I’ve tried to do some research into the structure and funding of their empire but being based in India means factual information is limited. From a couple of ratings agencies I’ve managed to find that there is one particular company in the VH Group that has a huge cash reserve and seems to proved most of the funding for the other members of the group.

I would agree with Andy, legal cases always rely heavily on precedent and as you say this has already been set so unless there is a specific or major change in the circumstances around the case then I think it’s likely they will rule in favour of VHPL again.

Not sure I’d agree with that, having to take the Indian authorities to the High Court to sanction the release of funds to cover operating costs would suggest to me it is, or was, very real.

As Herbie says this would be highly unlikely. I’m also fairly sure there are restrictions around an entity borrowing money to raise its issued share capital. Also, I don’t think this relates to previous money sent being converted to share capital as the the date of the increase in share capital is 10th October and going by previous filings for VLL and VHL this appears to be the date of the equity infusion rather than the filing date at CH. Speculation of course though.

That’s correct, that’s the company that owns the training ground, probably the final portion of the payment due to the club for the sale of the training ground. However, does this then mean that the restrictions on Venkys sending money to overseas group companies have been lifted? It would appear so.

I can’t see how at the moment the latest revelation changes anything. It appears that of the circa £220m that VHP have remitted to VLL to provide funding for BRFC, £3m or so of this money was actually remitted to another venture and not BRFC but this was not declared. The fact that the true destination of this £3m wasn’t declared is the issue here. It would appear that the remaining £217m or so has been properly allocated and although Indian Tax and Investment Law isn’t an area I know too much about I’d think there’s little the authorities can do on that. The value of assets being seized are pocket change to Venkys but the fact that the IG are seizing assets would suggest Venkys dispute their findings and therefore are refusing to repay these amounts, leaving asset freezing / seizure as the only way for the IG to get security for the alleged amounts owed.

I was surprised and a bit underwhelmed by this appointment, for me he was someone that is a familiar name but nobody was really aware of what he had actually done. After a bit of research coupled with the views of fans from his previous clubs I am a little more optimistic. It would appear as though this is a step up from Coyle, to be honest thought the only thing that matters is that he keeps us up, although I would really hope it turns into more than that. If he does, then a positive summer transfer window is needed and I just can't see that happening under Venkys.