Taliban’s entry into Afghanistan harms Indian business endeavors.

The Taliban invasion of Afghanistan put Indian companies’ infrastructure projects in jeopardy. Still, even worse, the Afghanistan International Bank is trying to covertly cash bank guarantees even though it has invoked force majeure clauses and isn’t fully paid for the work already completed.

This was disclosed in a petition KEC International filed with the Supreme Court as the RPG group’s flagship international infrastructure company. Its attorneys, A M Singhvi and Bansuri Swaraj, informed the SC that KEC had invoked the “force majeure” clause to express its inability to complete five infrastructure projects it had undertaken in Afghanistan due to the bloody invasion and the dire political situation in 2021.

Before a court panel made up of Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justice P S Narasimha, Singhvi requested an urgent hearing. He claimed that the company had not yet been paid in full for the work completed. Afghanistan International Bank (AIB) was attempting to claim the bank guarantees that Indian banks Bank of India and Axis bank had provided on the company’s behalf for the project work, which totaled Rs 300 crore.

KEC successfully obtained an interim order preventing the Indian banks from allowing the encashment of the bank guarantees by AIB in all five projects. At the same time, AIB was able to obtain an interim order from a single judge of the Bombay High Court in one of the cases dismissed by a division bench of the same HC. KEC hurried to the SC to request a stay of the bank guarantee’s encashment, and the CJI posted the petition for hearing on Monday.