Supreme Court junks plea of Kalanithi Maran & KAL Airways seeking ₹1,323 cr from SpiceJet

The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld the Delhi High Court’s decision to dismiss an appeal filed by KAL Airways founder Kalanithi Maran seeking ₹1,323 crore in damages from low-cost carrier SpiceJet owing to a long-standing share transfer dispute.

Maran, the former promoter of SpiceJet, along with KAL Airways, approached the Supreme Court earlier this month to contest the Delhi High Court’s May 23 ruling. However, a bench comprising Justice P. S. Narasimha and Justice A. S. Chandurkar rejected their special leave petition.

Pronouncing the order, Justice Chandurkar said: "Both the special leave petitions are dismissed."

In a sharply worded judgment, the Delhi High Court, in its May 23 order, said this is a case in which the appellants took a "calculated gamble" by their delay in refiling. "This, therefore, we reiterate, is not a simple case of delay in removing objections in refiling the appeals. It is a case of deliberate and wilful concealment of facts both from the Division Bench as well as from the respondents and a calculated gamble taken by the appellants," the order stated.

The dispute between the two dates back to 2015 when Maran approached Ajay Singh, SpiceJet’s current chairman and managing director, who had been associated with the airline previously. The ownership of the airline was transferred to Singh for ₹2.

At the time of transfer, the company had debt and liabilities outstanding of over ₹3,500 crore with immediate payables of around ₹2,200 crore, and its Boeing fleet was reduced from 41 to 17 aircraft.

To keep the debt-laden carrier afloat, Singh asked the Marans to put in a substantial amount of money to clear up dues including tax liabilities, and also provided some liquidity to keep the company running. It is this ₹578 crore — invested by the Sun Group at the time — which is now the main bone of contention.

After the Delhi High Court order last year, SpiceJet said that it would seek a refund of ₹450 crore out of the ₹730 crore it had previously paid to former promoter Kalanithi Maran and his firm, KAL Airways. SpiceJet had paid a total of ₹730 crore, comprising ₹580 crore in principal along with an additional ₹150 crore towards interest, to Maran and KAL Airways.

The no-frills carrier's domestic market share more than halved to 2.4% in May 2025 from 5.4% in May 2023, according to data available on the aviation regulator DGCA’s website.