COMPARATIVE STUDY OF POWERS AFFORDED TO THE COMMITTEE OF CREDITORS UNDER BANKRUPTCY LAWS IN INDIA AND THE UK

AUTHOR – PRANAV SRINIVAS, STUDENT AT SCHOOL OF LAW, CHRIST (DEEMED TO BE UNIVERSITY)

BEST CITATION – PRANAV SRINIVAS, COMPARATIVE STUDY OF POWERS AFFORDED TO THE COMMITTEE OF CREDITORS UNDER BANKRUPTCY LAWS IN INDIA AND THE UK, INDIAN JOURNAL OF LEGAL REVIEW (IJLR), 6 (3) OF 2026, PG. 188-197, APIS – 3920 – 0001 & ISSN – 2583-2344.

INTRODUCTION

Corporate insolvency frameworks exist to deal with a tension core to it is to recover the maximum amount of creditors, and at the same time permit the prospect of salvaging distressed businesses. The insolvency law therefore carries out not merely a distributive role, but also expresses underlying policy considerations regarding the rights of creditors, the nature of the business rescue process and the relative position of courts and professional interveners. One of the key questions in these systems is who ends up ruling the decision-making process after one has defaulted.

The Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 (IBC) of India follows a creditor-in-control model, according to which decisive power is granted to the Committee of Creditors (CoC) which is primarily comprised of financial creditors. In its turn, the Insolvency Act of 1986 of the United Kingdom, followed by further reforms, such as the Enterprise Act of 2002, adheres to a practitioner-dominated paradigm, in which the leading operational role goes to the insolvency practitioners, and creditor committees are placed in the oversight role, instead of governing role.

In this paper, comparative study of the powers of CoC in India, and creditor committees in the United Kingdom, will be discussed. It examines their legal underpinnings, judicial interpretations, realities of operation and the scholarly discussions enveloping them. The comparison shows that there are two guiding philosophies of these two jurisdictions, India trusts creditors directly, and the United Kingdom trusts professional intermediaries and judicial controls. Comparing these models, the current study has been able to come up with strengths, weaknesses and possible areas of reforms of these two legal systems.