Indian billionaire Pramod Mittal, who is unavailable to Bosnia and Herzegovina’s judiciary, which accuses him of organized crime, and has previously initiated arbitration against our country due to a dispute in the GIKIL company, and the Government of Tuzla Canton has prepared an answer to that. They state that the lawsuit is unfounded and without valid documentation.
The Government of Tuzla Canton accepted the text of the response to part of the allegations from the arbitration claim of Pramod Mittal and others against Bosnia and Herzegovina.
As stated by the Government of TK, the lawsuit basically claims, baselessly and without valid argumentation, that Bosnia and Herzegovina violated, that is, violated the obligations from the Agreement between our country and the Republic of India on the promotion and protection of investments.
“As stated in the Conclusion of the answer itself, there are no violations by the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina, nor violations of the Agreement between Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Republic of India on the promotion and protection of investments from September 12, 2006. Bosnia and Herzegovina and its state bodies are not have in no way interfered in the work and operations of GIKIL and that all investments have been recorded by the competent Ministry and at the Registry Court, as well as in the book of shares in the GIKIL Company”, is part of the text of the response of the Government of TK.
Also, as written, it is stated that the claimants’ requests to turn to the Arbitration Tribunal are not allowed, since the claimants, that is the Mittal family, do not have active identification in accordance with the concluded Agreement between Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Republic of India on the promotion and protection of investments of 12 September 2006, and the foreign investor GSHL is based in the Isle of Man (UK) and not in India, which is why the Arbitral Tribunal is not competent to resolve this dispute.
“It is also emphasized that Bosnia and Herzegovina treated the GIKIL company equally as all other companies in accordance with the applicable laws of Bosnia and Herzegovina, without any discrimination, as well as that the GIKIL company operated independently in accordance with the laws of Bosnia and Herzegovina and that the same company has been doing business with a large loss for the entire time, which is still negatively affecting the business today,” the Government of TK points out.
Problems with GIKIL have existed for many years, and the whole situation was escalated by the arrest of former members of the Supervisory Board and management in that sly company. They are Pramod Mittal, Rajib Das, Parameš Batačari, Ivana Bunoza, Mata Pavković, Erna Mehmedović, Faik Buševac and Vehid Mešić.
Also on the arrest list was Mittal’s daughter Shristi, who is unavailable to the prosecuting authorities. Her father, who was released after his arrest, also became unavailable to the judiciary. Not long after that, his departure from BiH followed, and the accusation of organized crime weighing 21 million BAM is still present.
From an address outside Bosnia and Herzegovina, Mittal began to strike Bosnia and Herzegovina by initiating arbitration proceedings. This dispute could cost our country hundreds of millions or even several billion dollars, and the financial losses are already being felt.
Namely, at the end of last year, the Council of Ministers of Bosnia and Herzegovina, on the proposal of the Attorney General of Bosnia and Herzegovina, made a decision on the sources of financing obligations for the purpose of conducting international investment arbitration proceedings in the case of the lawsuit of Pramod Mittal, Sangeeta Mittal, Vartika Mittal, Shristi Mittal and Divyesh Mittal against the defendant Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The Council of Ministers of BiH approved up to 800,000 BAM from the budget with the aim of protecting the legal and property interests of BiH in this arbitration procedure.
The funds are intended for the hiring of a specialized law firm for handling international investment disputes that will be chosen by the BiH Attorney General’s Office to jointly represent Bosnia and Herzegovina in this arbitration proceeding, as well as for the payment of deposits for the work of the arbitration tribunal and the hiring of legal and financial experts.
Lukavac GIKIL was created by the merger of KHK Lukavac and Global infrastructure Holdings Ltd, and after certain changes to the contract, Global Steel Holdings Ltd (GSHL) was listed as a co-founder. In the whole story, in 2003, the Government of TK, on behalf of the state company KHK, signed a strategic partnership agreement with GSHL and gave it management of its share in the joint company GIKIL.
GSHL received the majority management rights, but, according to the earlier claims of the Government of TK, it never fulfilled its obligations from the contract, which related to the investment in the joint company, while KHK fulfilled all obligations on the same basis. GSHL was awarded 51 percent of the management rights under the contract, although KHK has a 67 percent stake when looking at the company’s equity.
GSHL is a company in liquidation, and its head was the former president of the Supervisory Board of GIKIL, Pramod Mittal, who was arrested in Lukavac in the summer of 2019 under an extremely difficult operation lawsuits that he created a criminal group that was involved in extracting approximately 21 million BAM from Bosnia and Herzegovina. companies.
When it comes to BiH. side of the story, Mittal and his associates, i.e. GSHL, were excluded from the story in GIKIL, based on court decisions, i.e. the prosecutor’s proposal that was adopted.
Namely, after the arrest of Mittal and his associates, they were released, and the decision indicated a prohibition measure related to dealing with the call in GIKIL.
Everything else is secured by a guarantee of three million BAM and a 21 million mark property claim. Mittal is allegedly suing BiH for violating the Agreement between BiH and the Government of the Republic of India, called the BIT.
The company GSHL entered into a “business partnership” with the company KHK, which was represented by the Tuzla Canton Government, by taking ownership of GIKIL. Mittal now feels that he was cheated, considering that he was the only one investing in the company all the time, and GSHL and Mittal gave guarantees when the big economic crisis hit, without which the company would have shut down, while the Government of TK only reaped the financial benefits.
And when GIKIL began to achieve positive financial results – they removed Mittal from the whole story and appointed all their representatives to the Supervisory Board and management of GIKIL, most of them are members of the SDA party, although the Contract and the Company’s Statute define that KHK appoints two members supervisory board, and GSHL three members.
Mittal now believes that the Government of TK is to blame for everything, and therefore the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which he is suing, Klix.ba writes.
