Ousted resolution professional loses both NCLAT appeals; stay he won by concealing NCLT orders is vacated

NCLAT holds that a resolution professional removed from the personal insolvency of a Mahavir Roads guarantor has no interest left in appeals filed in that role, reprimands him for his conduct, and records that he hid two NCLT orders to obtain an interim stay.

The National Company Law Appellate Tribunal has dismissed two appeals by Kairav Anil Trivedi, the resolution professional removed from the personal insolvency of Jitendra Kikavat, a guarantor of Mahavir Roads and Infrastructure Private Limited, after he refused the NCLT Mumbai direction to put his repayment plan to a meeting of creditors and told that bench it had no choice but to approve it. In an order of 15 October 2026, a bench of Justice Mohammad Faiz Alam Khan, Member (Judicial), and Arun Baroka, Member (Technical), held that once removed he had no interest left in appeals filed as resolution professional, found that he had concealed the NCLT orders of 7 and 8 May 2026 when he obtained an interim stay, reprimanded him for the manner in which he argued in person, and vacated the stay so that his successor can convene the creditors.

A repayment plan filed after 355 days and never shown to creditors

Bank of Baroda filed CP (IB) No. 139 of 2022 against Kikavat as personal guarantor, and Trivedi was appointed resolution professional on admission. Bank of India, which was not a party to the petition, filed its claim with him on 27 August 2024. Its counsel told NCLAT that the bank then heard nothing from him until he filed IA No. 413 of 2026 seeking approval of a repayment plan, and that this happened only after the NCLT, faced with prolonged silence, listed the petition on its own motion. The application came after a lapse of 355 days. The bank said Trivedi had filed no periodic progress reports and no compliance reports, had given the financial creditors no opportunity to discuss the plan, and had framed it so as to relieve the personal and corporate guarantors of the corporate debtor of their guarantee liabilities. The breakup of the process costs, it added, had never been approved and remained doubtful.

On 2 February 2026 the NCLT, Bench No. 1, directed Trivedi to convene a meeting of creditors and place the proposed repayment plan and the estimated personal insolvency resolution process cost before them. He took the position that placing the plan before creditors was not required by the Code and filed Comp. App. (AT) (Ins) No. 828 of 2026 against the direction. Bank of India relied on Section 114(3) of the Code, which allows the adjudicating authority to direct the resolution professional to reconvene a meeting of creditors where it considers that a repayment plan requires modification, and said the NCLT was well within its jurisdiction.

The 7 May hearing: he told the NCLT it could not remove him

The NCLT’s order of 7 May 2026 records what Trivedi said that day. He informed the bench that it could not remove him as resolution professional and that he had been serving meeting notices on the creditors. He submitted that the plan had been filed for approval under the proviso to Section 106(2) and that the tribunal had “no choice but to approve the said Plan” and ought not to direct him to place it before the creditors. He also disclosed that he had appealed the 2 February order and that the appeal was pending. The creditors, for their part, categorically rejected the plan at that hearing and asked that he be directed to convene a meeting to clarify the issues raised.

The NCLT found his approach “adamant and non-cooperative to the process itself”, as already recorded in its 2 February order, held that it was a fit case to change the resolution professional, and directed counsel for the creditors to suggest another insolvency professional. Trivedi resisted the observation. On 8 May 2026 the creditors’ counsel informed the NCLT that a joint lenders’ meeting had decided to appoint a new resolution professional and sought time to file an application. IA No. 3095 of 2026 followed, and by order of 24 July 2026 the NCLT removed Trivedi and appointed Prashant Jain in his place. Bank of India also alleged that Trivedi had misbehaved with the bench, argued disrespectfully, challenged its authority and tried to compel a favourable order.

Two appeals, a stay, and two orders left unmentioned

On 29 May 2026 Trivedi filed Comp. App. (AT) (Ins) No. 1070 of 2026 against the 7 May order, and the same day obtained an interim direction in his first appeal that the creditors’ meeting ordered by the NCLT need not be convened. He did not tell NCLAT about the orders of 7 and 8 May. The bench found that on both dates he was no longer the resolution professional in substance, the financial creditors having decided to replace him and informed the NCLT, and that he kept those orders back in order to obtain the stay. It called the concealment deliberate.

Appearing in person, Trivedi argued that his removal was patently illegal because NCLAT’s 29 May order had directed that the meeting not be convened, and that the Code did not oblige him to call one. Asked pointedly whether he had challenged his removal and the appointment of his successor, he said that Appeal No. 1070 covered the direction to the creditors to suggest a replacement and that he had filed a further appeal on 18 August 2026, Diary No. 991013809267, against the appointment of the new resolution professional. Asked how he could maintain the present appeals without any authorisation once his appointment had ended, he replied that challenging the removal direction was sufficient.

Why a removed resolution professional cannot keep appealing

The bench opened its findings with a reprimand for the manner in which Trivedi argued and the way he referred to a former Chairperson by name, saying his demeanour bore out the conduct the NCLT had recorded. His conduct before the NCLT was not up to the mark, and he had in a way misused the interim order of 29 May. He had told the NCLT he was issuing meeting notices while simultaneously appealing against the direction to hold the meeting, and had told it on 7 May that it had no option but to approve his plan.

Mily Ghoshal, appearing by video conference for the new resolution professional, said her client would abide by NCLAT’s directions including convening any meeting of creditors, had been unable to do so only because of the stay, and did not wish to press the appeals, which had become infructuous. She submitted that a removed resolution professional could not continue them.

The bench agreed. Trivedi had filed both appeals as resolution professional in Kikavat’s personal insolvency; once removed, he had no interest left in them. The correctness of the removal order could be examined only in the separate appeal in which he had challenged it, and in any event “any Resolution Professional is not having a right vested to continue as such”. The present appeals concerned the process the resolution professional must follow in a personal guarantor’s insolvency and the direction to creditors to propose a new appointee. With Prashant Jain in office and ready to convene the creditors to consider the repayment plan as the NCLT had directed, a suspended resolution professional removed by the adjudicating authority could not maintain the appeals.

Order

Both appeals were dismissed for want of merit. The interim order of 29 May 2026 was vacated. Having regard to the facts and circumstances, no costs were imposed. Pending interlocutory applications were disposed of. The appeal against the appointment of the new resolution professional, filed on 18 August 2026, was not before the bench.