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ANZ vs NHB case deferred till July

The Supreme Court on Tuesday deferred till July a hearing on a long running dispute between Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd and India's National Housing Bank, a source familiar with the case said.

He said a three-judge bench had decided to defer the hearing of the case to July, when the Supreme Court reopens after a summer recess, because it needed more time to study the case.

Last week, out-of-court negotiations between NHB and ANZ to settle the Rs 15.22 billion dispute failed.

The long pending dispute stems from a claim of Rs 5.06 billion made by NHB on Grindlays Bank, then owned by ANZ, for wrongfully crediting cheques issued by NHB to the account of a broker at the centre of a 1992 share market scandal.

The Reserve Bank of India ordered ANZ to return the money to NHB, but in 1997 an arbitrator ordered NHB to pay back ANZ Rs 9.12 billion including interest.

A special court set aside the award in 1998, a move which ANZ then appealed to the Supreme Court.

The Court will break for a summer vacation in the second week of May and reopen on July 9, but will not have time to take up the case before the break, because there is a huge backlog, the source said.

NHB is fully owned by the Reserve Bank of India.

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