BharatPe vs Centrum: Multi-Million Dispute Hits Delhi HC Over Unity Bank Stake Dilution

The petition has been filed under Section 9 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act, 1996, against JBCG Advisory Services Private Limited, Centrum Financial Services Limited and Unity Small Finance Bank.

Justice Tushar Rao Gedela issued notice in the petition on September 9, 2026. The respondents have been granted two weeks to file their replies, while Resilient Innovations may file its rejoinder within three days thereafter. The matter has been listed for consideration on October 1, 2026.

Resilient has sought an interim injunction restraining JBCG and Centrum, along with persons acting on their behalf, from transferring, offering, marketing or creating any encumbrance over Series 1 and Series 2 warrants of Unity Small Finance Bank without its prior written consent.

The company has also sought directions restraining Unity Small Finance Bank from registering, recording or giving effect to any transfer or encumbrance involving the disputed warrants.

The petition further seeks disclosure of complete particulars of the warrants, including their present holders, the number and series of warrants held by each holder, details of transfers, consideration paid, approvals obtained and particulars of any encumbrance created over the warrants.

Advocates Mohit Goel, Sidhant Goel, Anuj B., Deepankar Mishra, Aisha Jain, Shashwat Mukherjee, Ishaan Pratap Singh, Suradish Vats and Darpan Sachdeva appeared for Resilient Innovations.

Senior Advocate Rajshekhar Rao, along with Advocates Ashish Aggarwal and Nalin Dhingra appeared for JBCG. Centrum was represented by Advocates Ajay Monga and Amol Sharma, while Unity Bank was represented by Advocates Sanjay Gupta, Ateev Mathur and Jagriti Ahuja.

Dispute over Unity Bank Warrants

The dispute relates to warrants allotted to Centrum in November 2021. Centrum holds a 51 per cent stake in Unity Small Finance Bank, while BharatPe holds the remaining 49 per cent.

BharatPe has alleged that JBCG transferred approximately 6.74 crore Series 1 warrants and four crore Series 2 warrants. It has further alleged that JBCG and Centrum created encumbrances over around 15 crore Series 1 warrants and 16.92 crore Series 2 warrants without obtaining its prior written consent.

One of the transactions cited by BharatPe concerns the alleged pledge of eight crore Series 2 warrants by JBCG in favour of Vistra ITCL (India) Limited, acting as trustee for UTI Alternatives. BharatPe has claimed that JBCG raised approximately ₹200 crore against the pledged warrants and subsequently transferred four crore warrants to schemes of UTI Alternatives.

The petition also refers to the prices at which the warrants were transferred. According to BharatPe, Centrum had subscribed to the warrants at Re 0.01 per warrant and later transferred 50 crore warrants to JBCG at Re 0.16 each. BharatPe has stated that it reasonably believed that JBCG subsequently offered the warrants at around ₹26 each.

These allegations are yet to be adjudicated.

Arbitration Proceedings

Resilient Innovations invoked arbitration on August 11 and nominated former Supreme Court judge Justice Vineet Saran as its nominee arbitrator.

The present petition follows an earlier Section 9 proceeding before the Delhi High Court concerning the conversion of Series 1 warrants. In July, the Court had granted interim protection to BharatPe in a related dispute concerning a proposal involving Unity Bank’s share capital and rights under the parties’ shareholders’ agreement.

BharatPe has stated that it contributed approximately ₹746 crore towards the repayment of depositors of the erstwhile Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative Bank as part of the transaction that led to the establishment of Unity Bank.