When the country’s apex court initiates proceedings on its own motion over mounting delays in NCLT, it drives home the point: Our decade-old bankruptcy regime (IBC) has increasingly become judicialized and plodding.The latest high-profile litigant is billionaire Anil Agarwal after the system that aided him eight years ago to scalp bankrupt assets recently turned against him.Back in 2018, Tata Steel was not allowed to revise its bid for Electrosteel Steels by the lenders, even after verbal assurances during a corporate insolvency process. Agarwal’s resources conglomerate Vedanta, the competing bidder, walked away with the bankrupt steel works.But when Agarwal locked horns with Gautam Adani in 2026 to stake claim over the cement and power plants, coal mines, sprawling real estate and hotels including the prized Buddh F1 circuit of Jaiprakash Associates, Vedanta’s revised offer was jettisoned by the lenders for allegedly missing the deadline. Vedanta claimed its revision, made through an addendum, was higher in both gross value and net present value (NPV). Still, an overwhelming 89% of the committee of creditors (CoC) voted in favour of Adani’s plan that had baked in a higher upfront payment and a faster payout timeline. When the lenders did not heed Agarwal’s proposal of a higher upfront cash payout, the takeover battle became open season on social media and then in the courtrooms where Vedanta petitioned against the CoC’s “capricious exercise” of power.The courts (NCLT) have ruled against Agarwal, but the Jaypee matter has once again unleashed a raging debate over arbitrary decision-making by financial creditors, lack of transparency, favouritism, subjective selection criteria for cherry-picking a winning bid as well as the possible conflict of interest of the committee of creditors (CoC).Companies referred to IBC typically have zero equity value left. Quicker the resolution, the faster the recovery of invested capital by banks and trade creditors for redeployment into productive sectors of the economy. Long-drawn litigations simply reduce recovery rates and widen the conflict between legislative intent and actual outcomes.By NCLT’s own admission to the SC, as recent as late last month, resolution plans for 383 applications remain pending approval. With delays ranging from 48 days to as much as 738 days—more than double the intended timeline -- some matters are left hanging for nearly four years.In the formative years of IBC, lenders were given extra teeth to counter truant plutocrats who had gamed the banking sector. Today, most of those highly indebted ‘dirty dozen’ corporations have come under the hammer. Bank NPAs are no longer a systemic risk. It’s the opportune time to reengineer the code even further.Unlike Britain, where the administrator is the final decision-maker, in India even today, the committee of creditors (CoC) sits at the head of the table doubling up as the orchestrating agency. The administrator or the resolution professional (RP) behaves like a sidekick. There is a inherent conflict if the biggest claimant is also the driver of the entire exercise, with disproportionate influence on operations and distribution of proceeds.Seldom a homogenous motley, driving consensus within the CoC is always a time-consuming endeavour. Relying on their discretionary commercial wisdom to swing the final voting is equally ironic. It was the same commercial wisdom that led many of them into this mess in the first place. Bankrolling several unviable and even dodgy projects without sufficient diligence and lax debt covenants was the genesis of ballooning bad loans once several projects went bust in subsequent years. These self-inflicted victims now cannot act as the referee and the receiver.Like a true interim CEO, the RP becomes the all-powerful facilitator, responsible for running the company and having the last word on all commercial and strategic issues. That also means taking ownership of the bidding process, being responsible for its conduct and acting as the final arbiter. But he should also be personally liable and open to any challenge by the oversight mechanism of the NCLT. Logically then, his remuneration should also be in sync with the risks undertaken.In 2018, our parliamentarians made RPs less accountable by doing away with the provision that sought a personal bond for their performance. They feared it would dissuade them from large or contentious insolvency assignments. But ten years in, India needs a fast maturing of the RP ecosystem to work without fear or favour. It should be the regulator’s (IBBI’s) top priority to insulate them from cronyism, empowering them to take the best judgement call and be accountable for their own skin.The RP’s independence also gains significance since it is important to retain the entity under IBC a going concern. A well-defined code of conduct with a definitive timeline for outcome is essential to make the process beneficial for the wider stakeholder base and not just one set of claimants – the CoC lenders. Only a comprehensive plan that also considers the interests of suppliers, customers, employees and even the government can yield the best outcome.To make the outcome fair, it is equally important to suspend trading of all listed securities of companies, the moment they are admitted into IBC. It should be put back after a successful bidder is handed over the key. Bizarrely, we still allow speculators and vested interests to influence price.The current system of a matrix driven curated bidding criteria that allows customisation by individual bidders has also overcomplicated matters. It has made bid comparability an opaque evaluation, prone to litigation. A transparent electronic bidding process similar to mining and other government auctions is a much better alternative than one involving closed envelopes that forces contenders to play blind. Maximise value through multiple rounds after ensuring information symmetry across all bidders.Finally bid only on a single metric: Enterprise value, achieved on the basis of an independent valuation report which the RP needs to sign off. That becomes the base price. But to make it a win-win for all parties, the winner has to ensure full upfront payment just like any other M&A transaction. Before the bidding process opens, all outstanding aspects relating to the transaction must also be resolved by the RP who should also make the formula for the distribution of the EV clear to both financial and operational creditors and stand by it.For a country desperate for FDI, a simple, transparent IBC will widen the pool of suitors, giving healthy competition to the biggest homegrown industrial quartet of Adani, JSW, Reliance, and Tata that have reportedly scooped up assets worth nearly a quarter of total admitted claims in IBC, though cumulatively accounting for just 2% of the total resolutions so far. Credible global strategic bidders have always ratcheted up recoveries saving banks from the usual deep haircuts. Remember Essar Steel?