Stassen Exports vs. HNB and others: Court calls for written submissions on 2 Feb.

The Commercial High Court last week directed all parties in case No. 59/2016/CO – Stassen Exports Ltd. versus Hatton National Bank Plc and 15 others - to tender written submissions on the preliminary objection on 2 February 2017 and fixed the order for 14 February 2017.

This case came up on 26 January 2017 before Commercial High Court Judge Shiran Guneratne, for inquiry with regard to the application made by the first respondent, Hatton National Bank, and third respondent, the CEO of the bank, to vacate or set aside the interim orders obtained by the petitioner relating to the proposed share issue of Hatton National Bank to the Asian Development Bank.

The petitioner, the sixth and eighth respondent, who are two directors of the bank, the 15th respondent, Milford Exports Ceylon Ltd, and the 16th respondent, Distilleries Corporation, took up a preliminary objection to the applications made by the bank and its CEO on the basis that the said applications were bad in law since apart from the petitioner the other respondents who were already before Court had not been made parties to the application made by the bank and its CEO. 

The Counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner, the sixth, eighth, 15th and 16th respondents contended that the bank and its CEO were not entitled to leave out parties who were before Court and as such all respondents should have been made parties to their application to vacate the interim order. The Counsel appearing on behalf of the bank and its CEO said that it was sufficient to make only the petitioner a party to their application to vacate the interim order.

Nihal Fernando PC, with Harshula Seneviratne and Minuri Dissanayake instructed by Upendra Gunesekera, appeared for the petitioner Stassen Exports Ltd, Romesh De Silva PC with Shanaka Cooray appeared for the first respondent Hatton National Bank. Palitha Kumarasinghe PC with Harith De Mel appeared for the CEO of the bank and for several other Directors. N.R. Sivendran with Dushyanthi Jayasuriya and V. Pavithra appeared for the sixth and eighth respondent, Directors of the bank. Rajindra Jayasinghe with Romali Tudawe appeared for Milford Exports Ceylon Limited. S.A. Parathalingam PC with Nishkan Parathalingam appeared for Distilleries Corporation. Chandrakumar De Silva appeared for the 17th respondent.