NCLT has granted Future Retail Ltd (FRL) a 90-day extension to complete the company’s corporate insolvency resolution process (CIRP).

Allowing FRL’s plea, the Mumbai judges of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) have extended the deadline to July 15, 2023, to complete FRL’s CIRP.

“The NCLT heard the application on April 13, 2023, and granted the aforementioned 90-day CIRP FRL exclusion and subsequently extended the completion of the CIRP until July 15, 2023,” a regulatory filing from the company said.

The FRL added that the order NCLT announced on April 13, 2023, “is awaiting a written order.” NCLT initiated the CIRP against the FRL on July 20, 2022, following the loan default.

The Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) resolution period is 330 days, including litigation time.

Under Article 12(1) of the Code, a CIRP should be completed within 180 days from initiation. However, the NCLT can be extended for a one-time extension of 90 days. The maximum time the CIRP must be compelled to be completed (including any extensions or litigation periods) is 330 days.

Last week, FRL said they had received expressions of interest (EoI) from 49 participants, including Reliance Retail, Jindal Power Ltd and Adani Group, to acquire FRL’s assets.

On March 23, 2023, FRL’s Resolution Professionals (RP) invited new expressions of interest for potential buyers to bid for the heavily indebted company “as a going concern, as a single cluster, or as a group of Attract a solution plan within more than a month.

Earlier, it had received expressions of interest and finalised 11 potential bidders, including Reliance and April Moon Retail, but could not secure a solution despite both submission deadlines being extended.

The committee of creditors offered two options in the EoI, with a final submission date of April 7, 2023.

In the first option, the Prospective Resolution Applicant (PRA) could bid to acquire Future Retail, including its stake in its subsidiaries. Under the second option, Future Retail’s business is spread across five cluster dives, where the PRA can bid for “any single cluster or any combination of clusters”.

By invitation, FRL currently has access to 302 leased retail outlets spread across 23 states and the Union Territories, including 30 larger stores such as Big Bazaar and FBB stores and 272 smaller stores.