The Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) announced on Monday that the next hearing in the Zee merger case will be held on June 26, according to ET Now.

SAT refused to grant interim relief to Essel Group chairman Subash Chandra and his son Punit Goenka on Friday after the markets regulator barred them from holding the position of director or key managerial personnel in any listed company and allegedly syphoning off funds from ZEEL. Following that, they filed an SAT challenge to the Sebi order.

According to Sebi, the syphoning of funds appears to be a well-planned scheme because, in some cases, the layering of transactions involved using as many as 13 entities as pass-through entities within two days.

The order came after Sebi investigated the resignation of two independent directors of ZEEL, Sunil Kumar and Neharika Vohra, in November 2019.

In a letter to the markets regulator SEBI, it said that “continuous and repetitive” investigations on the same cause of action create prejudice for the Company and Shareholders, and can potentially impact the merger process.

In a letter to SEBI, Zee said, “Please note that the said merger is at an advanced stage post receipt approvals from various regulators (including SEBI, Stock Exchanges and CCI, etc.) and the scheme is also approved by 99.9 percent of the equity shareholders of ZEEL”.

Zee said it may also be noted that the transactions in the present matter pertain to the year 2019 and a detailed explanation has already been provided to Stock Exchanges and SEBI.

“It is beyond our comprehension as to why the present matter is being re-investigating/re-examining, when the cause of action about the matter is around 4 years old,” the company said.

Sony’s board of directors is said to be unhappy with developments and is looking at invoking force majeure and material adverse clauses in the shareholder agreement in the proposed merger with Zee Entertainment in India.

SEBI has given a No Objection Certificate (NOC) to the Composite Scheme of Merger in the matter of ZEEL and Sony Pictures Networks India Pvt. Ltd (Sony), which is one of the largest integrations of industry majors in the media industry and entails an incoming foreign direct investment of $1.7 billion (approx.) into India.