A subsidiary of telecom giant Reliance Jio, Reliance Projects and Property Management Services, has placed Rs 3,720 crore in an SBI escrow account to purchase Reliance Infratel's smartphone tower and fiber assets.

In November, Jio received authorization from the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) to purchase Reliance Infratel (RITL).

Reliance Infratel issued shares and zero-coupon optionally fully convertible debentures to subsidiary Reliance Projects and Property Management Services for Rs 3,720 crore, according to Reliance Jio's announcement this week.

In November 2019, the Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Jio submitted a proposal of Rs 3,720 crore to purchase the tower and fiber assets of the debt-ridden subsidiary of the business Reliance Communications run by his younger brother Anil Ambani.

Jio was required by the tribunal to pay Rs 3,720 crore into an escrow account at the State Bank of India (SBI) in order to finalize the purchase of RCOM's tower and fiber assets.

The Jio resolution plan had previously received unanimous support from the Committee of Creditors on March 4, 2020. 43,540 mobile towers and over 178,000 route kilometers of fiber-optic infrastructure are owned by Reliance Infratel.

In a legal dispute over the allocation of cash, SBI and a few other banks, including Doha Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, and Emirates Bank, are involved. The Supreme Court is now deliberating the case. The resolution professional's characterization of the claims from RITL's indirect creditors as financial creditors had been contested by Doha Bank.

Once the inter-creditor disagreement over the distribution of settlement monies is resolved, the money will be divided among the lenders.