Hinduja's IIHL paid ₹9,861 crore for Reliance Capital, lifting lender recovery to 65%

In November 2021 the RBI superseded Reliance Capital's board and referred the company to the NCLT; the tribunal admitted the application in early December. The process pitted Torrent Investments against Hinduja's IIHL through a challenge mechanism and successive appeals.

IIHL emerged as the highest bidder in the second-round auction of April 2023 at ₹9,650 crore. In February 2024 the NCLT approved its ₹9,661-crore upfront plan, backed by 99.6% of lender votes; with ₹500 crore of cash left in the company, total recovery reached about ₹10,200 crore, or 65% of ₹16,000 crore of secured principal.

IIHL completed the acquisition on 18 March 2025, funding the ₹9,861-crore deal with ₹7,300 crore of debt from Barclays and 360 ONE plus ₹2,750 crore of equity, and injecting ₹200 crore into Reliance General Insurance. It took control of 42 entities and said it would list Reliance Nippon Life Insurance and Reliance General Insurance within two years.

Lenders received about ₹10,200 crore — a 65% recovery on ₹16,000 crore of secured debt — while IIHL took over 42 entities and plans to list the two insurance businesses.

The RBI referral and NCLT timeline forced a fast, supervised auction instead of years of bilateral restructuring.

A second challenge round let IIHL raise its bid above Torrent's, moving the price toward the ₹13,000-crore liquidation and ₹17,000-crore fair values.

The 99.6% CoC vote and court approval gave the winner a clean slate, letting IIHL fund the deal with debt and run the businesses instead of litigating.

Court supervision forced finality: two auction rounds, appeals and a 99.6% CoC vote settled the winner, and the ₹10,200-crore payout beat liquidation value while new owners promised listed insurers.

IIHL integrated Reliance Capital's financial businesses — insurance, securities and asset reconstruction — under Hinduja control, with Ashok Hinduja saying the group would keep insurance and securities while exiting the rest. The planned listings of the two insurers within two years were expected to repay part of the acquisition debt and return a once-stalled financial group to public markets.