ANZ, Pankaj and Radhika Oswal lawsuit: parties re-enter settlement talks

ANZ and Pankaj and Radhika Oswal are back in talks to settle a $1.5bn-plus lawsuit after dramatic evidence today.

Radhika Oswald leaves the Supreme Court of Victoria in Melbourne on Tuesday. Picture: AAP/Julian Smith.

ANZ Bank and Indian business couple Pankaj and Radhika Oswal are back in talks to settle a $1.5bn-plus lawsuit, after Mrs Oswal gave dramatic evidence in court today alleging strongarm tactics by the bank’s top lawyer.

Mrs Oswal was set to be cross-examined by counsel for the bank, Alan Archibald, QC, this afternoon but the hearing has instead been adjourned to tomorrow morning.

It is the second time this week Mrs Oswal’s evidence has been delayed by last-minute settlement talks — yesterday, her evidence-in-chief was put off until the afternoon while the parties conferred.

This morning, the Victorian Supreme Court heard ANZ’s chief legal officer, Bob Santamaria, threatened Mrs Oswal that both she and her husband would go to jail and their two young daughters become orphans if she did not pledge her stake in the couple’s business empire to the bank..

Mrs Oswal told the Victorian Supreme Court she met with Mr Santamaria at the end of a long day of negotiations over close to $1bn the couple owed the bank on Sunday, December 20, 2009 amid allegations of fraudulent documents.

She said that at the meeting, her lawyer, Grant Pestell, told Mr Santamaria she did not want to pledge her stake in the couple’s Burrup Fertilisers — some 32.5 per cent — to the bank.

She told the court Mr Santamaria responded: “Then do you realise both he and she could go to jail and both the children could be orphans.”

Under pressure, Mrs Oswal eventually signed the documents, she said.

“There was no other way out. I had a gun at my head.”

“I knew it was absolutely not in my commercial interest. In fact, I knew it was exposing me to a liability I did not have.”

Mrs Oswal was giving evidence this morning as part of Victorian Supreme Court lawsuit in which the couple claims at least $1.5bn from the ANZ for allegedly selling their stakes in Burrup Fertiliser for an undervalue after seizing it in 2010.

The December 20 meeting, at the Melbourne offices of law firm Freehills, was called at short notice after the ANZ alleged her husband Pankaj Oswal was involved in forging, or causing to be forged, crucial documents.

Asked if the allegations were true, Ms Oswal said: “I knew them to be true — Pankaj had told me himself.”

She said that earlier at the December 20 meeting, another lawyer, Darren Greenham, told her ANZ chief risk officer, Chris Page, put his arms around her husband and “was towering over him”.

Mrs Oswal said she never wanted to pledge her stake in Burrup — some 32.5 per cent — to the ANZ because it was not in her interests to do so.

She said she sent an SMS to Mr Pestell saying “I am happy now” after signing the documents because she had avoided her husband going to jail.