Net4India Issue Resolved

This has reference to the various discussions we have had on this website on the issue arising out of the insolvency petition on Net4India which resulted in thousands of domain name registrants and website companies being unable to operate their websites and E Mail accounts.

After Naavi.org escalated the issue to all levels, first NIXI resolved the transfer issue of  dot in domain names and now ICANN has also taken steps to resolve the transfer of other domain name extensions such as dot.com names.

ICANN has announced   today that it has activated the DARTP process (De-Accredited Registrar Transition Procedure) to enable the successful transition of domain names currently registered with Net 4 India limited to an ICANN accredited registrar who can serve the registrants.

It appears that NCLT which was holding up the resolution so far has cleared the process.

According to ICANN,

“ICANN org is initiating the DARTP process to identify and select a gaining registrar(s) as quickly as possible.

The gaining registrar(s) will assume various responsibilities, including supporting former Net 4 India Limited domain name registrants with the renewal, transfer, and management of their domain names as required in the RAA.

Once the gaining registrar(s) is identified and confirmed, it will be listed on the Bulk Transfers page.

ICANN expects to announce the gaining registrar(s) within the next two weeks.

Once the transfer of registrations has been completed, the new registrar(s) will contact registrants with information on how to access and maintain their domain name registrations.

It is critical that registrants follow the instructions provided by the gaining registrar(s) regarding how to manage their domain name registrations. There is no cost to registrants for the bulk transfer.”

There are still some issues such as the holders of e-mail addresses in vsnl.com domain which was discontinued by the Tatas. We have to wait and see how this would be resolved. We also need to see how the residual balances that the account holders held with Net 4 India would be accounted for.

It is a tragedy that the resolution took so much of time and NCLT needs to apologize to the Indian public for causing this issue and delaying resolution for such a long time.

The issue of Net 4 India taking a loan from SBI and defaulting is apparently a fraud that requires a CBI investigation. The NCLT needs to be educated on how it should meet its responsibilities to the society when the interests of the public are involved. The arrogance of being a Judicial authority should not give a license to NCLT to ignore the interest of 70000 plus members of the public. The MeitY, as well as the Supreme Court failed to intervene and resolve the issue.

I hope all these agencies learn a lesson from the incident and correct their actions in future.

Naavi