SpiceJet on Wednesday said it will seek a refund of Rs 450 crore out of the total Rs 730 crore paid to the airline’s former promoter Kalanithi Maran and his firm KAL Airways following a Delhi High Court ruling.

However, KAL Airways has countered the same saying that since the division bench has not passed any direction regarding refund on the money already paid, any such claim does not arise.

A division bench of the court, on May 17, set aside a single judge bench order that had upheld an arbitral award asking SpiceJet and its promoter Ajay Singh to refund Rs 579 crore plus interest to Maran.

The bench allowed the appeals filed by Singh and SpiceJet challenging the single judge’s order, passed on July 31, 2023, and remanded the matter back to the court concerned to consider the petitions challenging the arbitral award afresh.

Against this backdrop, the airline in a regulatory filing on Wednesday said it will seek a refund of Rs 450 crore out of the Rs 730 crore it had paid to Maran and KAL Airways.

“SpiceJet has paid a total of Rs 730 crore, comprising Rs 580 crore in principal along with an additional Rs 150 crore towards interest to Maran and KAL Airways. With the setting aside of the impugned order, SpiceJet is set to receive a refund of Rs 450 crore,” the airline said.

“The division bench has not opined that the award is wrong per se. It has merely required further elaboration on certain specific issues, suggesting that the single Judge consider these observations in reassessing the award’s validity. The division bench has neither made any observation nor given any finding regarding refund on the money already paid to KAL Airways and Kalanithi Maran ) by Spicejet. Therefore, any claim seeking return of the money already paid to Kal Airways and Maran under the directions of the Hon’ble Supreme Court as well as Hon’ble High Court does not arise at all. Any suggestion that the airline is entitled to a refund in our opinion is grossly misconceived and intended to cause mischief and to mislead the public, particularly investors,” KAL Airways said in a statement.

The case dates to January 2015, when Singh, who owned the airline earlier, bought it back from Maran after it was grounded for months due to resource crunch.

While the tribunal had asked Maran to pay Singh and the airline Rs 29 crore in penal interest, Singh was asked to refund Rs 579 crore plus interest to Maran.

The tribunal, created in 2016 on the orders of the Delhi High Court to adjudicate the share transfer dispute, had held that there was no breach of a share sale and purchase agreement reached between Maran and current promoter Singh in late January 2015.

In February 2015, Maran and his investment vehicle, had transferred their 58.46% stake in SpiceJet to Singh for Rs 2 along with Rs 1,500 crore debt liability, after the airline was grounded due to a severe cash crunch.

Singh was the first co-founder of the airline and is now its chairman and managing director.

As part of the agreement, Maran and Kal Airways had claimed to have paid Spicejet Rs 679 crore for issuing warrants and preference shares.

However, Maran approached the Delhi High Court in 2017, alleging SpiceJet had neither issued convertible warrants and preference shares nor returned the money.