A private equity firm has won a $47.3m summary judgment against Tahir Lakhani for failure to repay outstanding loans.

Justice David Foxton in the High Court in London made the judgment in favour of claimant Nordic Trustee, the loan security agent that had a personal guarantee from Lakhani for loans.

The loans were provided by lenders Njord Partners, its affiliate NPSSF Debt Co and Delaware-registered AIE III Investments, which are also claimants in the case.

The judgment, which includes interest, is the first to be awarded in separate lawsuits brought this year by Njord and alternative finance firm Yieldstreet against Lakhani and his family.

Robust defence

Lakhani is best known in shipping for heading Dubai Trading Agency, a cash buyer of ships for demolition, which is not a party to the legal action.

As TradeWinds has reported, five investment vehicles controlled by Yieldstreet are suing Lakhani and his sons, Ali and Hasan, in the High Court over a combined $76.7m in outstanding loans.

Tahir Lakhani told TradeWinds in April that he would “defend this claim robustly”. The Yieldstreet suit is still ongoing.

The Njord lenders’ claim relates to financing that was provided in 2017 to the defendants — Tahir and Ali Lakhani and their scrap vessel-­buying company Astir Maritime.

In total, $45m was lent to the defendants in three facilities of equal value that year.

Event of default

As well as a personal guarantee from Tahir Lakhani, the debt was secured by pledges of shares in Astir, assignments of assets and property belonging to Astir’s subsidiaries and mortgages on four vessels that had been acquired “as is” for demolition, according to the claimants.

Between September 2018 and July 2019, the funding was used to acquire 23 vessels for demolition. The Lakhanis claim that 30 acquisitions were funded.

Then, in February this year, Njord was informed by liquidators that Astir’s parent company, North Star Maritime Holdings, had elected to dissolve because it was insolvent.

This was deemed to constitute an event of default under the ­lending agreement, and Njord accelerated the loan in early March, making all of the loans immediately due and payable, plus interest.

Nordic Trustee served a demand on Tahir Lakhani in March under his personal guarantee, but no funds were repaid, according to the claim.

The claimants also alleged that Tahir and Ali Lakhani “made a series of false and deceitful statements to the lenders ... knowing them to be untrue” from late 2018 onwards.

“In outline, the deceit consisted of misrepresenting that the delivery of certain vessels was delayed,” the particulars of claim state.

“The true position was that the relevant vessels had already been delivered and broken up for scrap.”

It was on this basis that the lenders claimed they were entitled to seek compensatory damages against Ali Lakhani, who they said was responsible for the alleged deceit.

Freezing order

The lenders alleged that, by signing a series of approved borrower statements, Ali Lakhani represented that all transactions funded under the loans were permitted and that there was no continuing default.

In their reply, the defendants said Ali Lakhani did not sign any approved borrower statements and therefore could not have known that false or misleading information was being supplied to the lenders.

A spokesperson for the defendants declined to comment on the summary judgment. TradeWinds has approached Njord for comment but has not yet received a response.

Assets belonging to the Lakhanis, who are Pakistani nationals with British passports who reside primarily in Dubai, have been subject to a worldwide freezing order since mid-April.

In a court hearing held via Skype on 24 July, the Lakhanis’ lawyers appealed against the freezing order, stating that it had been put in place without declaring to the presiding judge that a standard undertaking in the order had been deleted.

It is standard for worldwide freezing orders to include the so-called Derby & Co v Weldon undertaking, in which applicants agree not to seek to enforce the injunction in any country outside England and Wales without permission from the court.

However, the undertaking had been omitted from the freezing order targeting the Lakhanis’ assets.

This, the defendants’ lawyers argued, was egregious, considering the claimants had sought to enforce the injunction in the United Arab Emirates, where the Lakhanis reside.

Injunction replaced

The claimants argued that Foxton had been provided with a marked-up copy of the draft order, showing that the undertaking had been deleted using struck-through text.

Their lawyers said it had been deleted because it was not consistent with enforcing the asset freeze in the UAE.

Justice Nigel Teare agreed on 24 July that the old freezing ­injunction should be replaced. He reinstated the Derby v Weldon undertaking and awarded the defendants' legal costs.