Claim No: CFI 098/2025

IN THE DUBAI INTERNATIONAL FINANCIAL CENTRE COURTS

THE COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

BETWEEN

BHANU CHOUDHRIE

Claimant

and

(1) DHARIYA CHOUDHRIE
(2) ANITA CHOUDHRIE

Defendants

ORDER WITH REASONS OF H.E. JUSTICE SIR JEREMY COOKE

UPON the Claimant’s Part 8 Claim Form dated 30 October 2025

AND UPON the Defendants’ Acknowledgment of Service and evidence in answer to the Part 8 Claim dated 26 November 2025

AND UPON hearing counsel for the Defendants at the Part 8 Claim Hearing held on 16 January 2026 before H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke, with the Claimant failing to appear

AND UPON the Orders of H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke dated 30 January 2026

AND UPON the Claimant’s Application No. CFI-098-2025/1 dated 13 February 2026 seeking an extension of time to file and serve its application to vary and stay the Order dated 30 January 2026 (and in particular, without limitation, paragraph 5 of the Order) (the “Extension Application”)

AND UPON the Order of H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke dated 2 March 2026, refusing the Extension Application

AND UPON the Defendants’ Urgent Application No. CFI-098-2025/2 dated 10 March 2026 for an urgent re-listing of the Part 8 Claim Hearing (the “Re-Listing Application”)

AND UPON hearing counsel for the Claimant and counsel for the Defendants at a second Part 8 Claim Hearing held on 16 March 2026 before H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke (the “Second Part 8 Hearing”)

AND UPON considering the applicable provisions of the DIFC Foundations Law (Law No. 3 of 2018) in relation to Stellar International Art Foundation (the “Foundation”)

IT IS HEREBY ORDERED THAT:

Interim Relief

1. Within 7 days of the date of this Order, the Court shall issue a notification to the DIFC Registrar of Companies directing the following:

2. A meeting of the Council of the Foundation shall take place as follows:

3. Within 7 days of the date of this Order, the Claimant shall disclose to the Defendants details (including inter alia in the form of copies of any related Court filing(s)) of any and all proceedings in the UK relating to the affairs or property of the Foundation, including matrimonial and related proceedings commenced in 2019 before the English High Court (Family Division) concerning the Claimant, insofar as they have not already been disclosed by the Defendants. The Claimant may redact any private or confidential information contained in any documents that he discloses in relation to the UK Court proceedings, that do not relate to the affairs or property of the Foundation.

4. Within 72 hours of the date of this Order, the Parties shall jointly instruct Mr Tushar or another agreed independent IT expert to provide the Parties with access to the following email address foundation@stellarart.ch, with the associated costs to be borne and settled by the Foundation.

5. The Claimant shall pay the Defendants’ costs of the Re-Listing Application, to be assessed by the Registrar if not agreed.

Declarations

6. It is declared that:

Directions

7. The Charter of Continuance shall be amended to record Foundation Management Co Inc as the sole Founder of the Foundation and the records maintained by the Registrar of Companies and under the electronic account on the DIFC client portal for the Foundation shall be amended accordingly.

8. Matters concerning the adoption of revised regulations, by-laws, and / or charter for the Foundation are reserved for discussion at the next duly convened Council Meeting.

9. In the absence of agreement, the parties shall have liberty to apply to the Court for directions on such matters.

Status of This Order

10. This Order does not constitute a final determination of the Part 8 Claim.

11. The parties shall have liberty to apply to the Court for the purpose of carrying this Order into effect.

12. With the exception of paragraph 5 above, all other matters relating to costs are reserved.

Issued by:
Hayley Norton
Assistant Registrar
Date of issue: 23 March 2026
At: 3pm

History of the Proceedings

1. The Defendants filed a Chronology to which reference can usefully be made to see the course of these proceedings commenced by the Claimant on 29 August 2025, with a Part 8 Claim Form filed on 30 October 2025. On 18 November 2025 the First Defendant filed an Acknowledgement of Service and a Witness statement in response. Following a failed attempt by the Claimant for default judgement, a hearing was set for 12 January 2026 which was adjourned at the Claimant’s request because of a medical problem of his legal representative. The adjourned hearing took place on 16 January 2025 at which the Claimant did not appear, despite it being said that the Claimant would appear in person. On 23 January 2026, a transcript of the hearing was served upon the Claimant and on 30 January 2026 an Order was issued which included provisional declarations which had been extensively debated at the hearing on 16 January, with liberty to apply. A further Order was made on the same day which provided for access of the Defendants to the DIFC client portal of the Foundation, for restrictions on filings or amendments there or to records at the Registrar of companies and for a meeting of the Council of the Foundation to take place within 30 days (the “Order”). The Order also included paragraph 5, as set out below. Neither Order has been appealed but on 13 February 2026, the Claimant sought a seven day extension of time for an application to vary paragraph 5 of the Order and for a stay of it in the meantime. In support of the Extension Application a witness statement was filed by the authorised legal representative of the Claimant dated 13 February 2026.

2. On 25 February 2026 the Defendants consented to an extension of time for the submission of evidence in relation to the extension of time sought but on 2 March 2026, following the submission of such evidence, the Court refused the Extension Application and required compliance with paragraph 5 of the Order by 5 March 2026, which represented a period of some five weeks from the Order (and longer since the provision of the transcript), failing which the Defendants were at liberty to relist the matter for determination of all outstanding matters.

The Order of 30 January 2026

3. Paragraph 5 of the Order provided as follows:

“Within 14 days of the date of this Order, the Claimant shall disclose to the Defendants details (including inter-alia in the form of copies of any related Court filing(s)) of any and all proceedings in the UK relating to the affairs or property of the Foundation, including matrimonial and related proceedings commenced in 2019 before the English High Court (Family Division) concerning the Claimant.”

4. From the Claimant’s own evidence, it is clear that no attempt was made to comply with this Order until after the Order of 2 March 2026 was made when contact was then made by the Claimant with his English lawyers, Vardags, who act for him in the matrimonial proceedings. This led to the Claimant himself filing a witness statement dated 5 March 2026 and a witness statement from a Senior Director of Vardags in which it was said that it was necessary to apply to the English Court in order to make disclosure of the documents referred to in paragraph 5 of the Order because of the requirements of confidentiality and privacy in matrimonial proceedings in England. Reliance was placed at the hearing on paragraphs 27 and 29 of the Family Procedure Rules 2010 (the “FPR”). These provide that family proceedings are to be held in private and, under the terms of those rules, no document or copy of a document filed or lodged in the court office is open for inspection by any person not a party to the proceedings, without the permission of the court and no copy of any such document is to be taken by any such person without permission. Paragraph 29(3) provides that a party to any proceedings may have a search made for and may inspect and obtain a copy of any document or copy of document filed or lodged in the court office in those proceedings.

5. In response, the Defendants filed the Second Witness Statement of Jonathan Brooks. The matter was relisted for 16 March 2026 where leading counsel appeared for the Claimant and the Defendants and both parties filed prior skeleton arguments. Notwithstanding the Claimant’s contentions that there were difficulties in complying with paragraph 5 of the Order, I am unable to see that that is truly the case. What the evidence shows is that Vardags acted at one time for the Foundation itself and then acted for the Claimant in the context of the matrimonial proceedings in England. Because of conflict, they cease to act for the Foundation which was nonetheless, at one point a party to the proceedings and, at another point, an intervenor because of its interest in them. It is self-evident that, during the periods when the Foundation was a party or and intervenor, there could be no breach of the FPR in the Claimant disclosing to the Foundation and those representing it materials in its possession in the matrimonial proceedings. There could be no need for the Claimant to seek any permission from the Family Court to make such disclosure. Nor could there be any problem in disclosing what was in their possession and was not caught by the FPR.

6. It was also argued that the ambit the documents referred to in paragraph 5 of the Order was such as to create difficulty in identifying the documents in question for which permission needed to be sought from the Family Court. I do not accept this either, since electronic search facilities are available to Vardags which would speedily enable such documents to be identified. To the extent that any approach was required to the Family Court, it could readily be done but the Claimant has done nothing at all to begin to comply with that part of the Order, none of which has been appealed. The Claimant, is therefore bound to observe its terms and has, it would appear, sought to obstruct the attempts of the Defendants to ascertain whether any property of the Foundation, in the possession of the Claimant and/or his former spouse, has been caught up in the matrimonial dispute and in the financial claims and orders sought by either party in the divorce proceedings.

7. In these circumstances I can see no basis for reconsideration of paragraph 5 of the Order and every reason to reinforce it in the terms sought by the Defendants, requiring compliance within seven days of the date of this order. There is a provision allowing redaction of any part of any document which does not relate to the affairs or property of the Foundation, so there should be no difficulty in complying with its terms. Court filings and Court Orders are plainly the most important documents to be disclosed and it is no answer that there is potentially another route by which the Defendants might obtain those documents, whether from Mr Temmink KC who at one time acted for the Foundation or by reference to Paragraph 29(3) of the FPR. The Claimant has a fiduciary duty to the Foundation to disclose all documents in his possession which relate to its affairs and must comply with paragraph 5 of the Order in the form now enshrined in this order.

The Provisional Declarations

8. Counsel for the Claimant advanced an argument that at least one of the provisional declarations set out in paragraph 3 of the other order of 30 January 2026 were unsustainable because, as a matter of Panamanian law, a “Founder” could be a nominee, behind whom stood the “Real Founder”. Thus, the order now sought by the Defendants at paragraphs 1(b), 6(c) and 7(b) in the form of final declarations should not be granted.

9. This does not however assist the Claimant because, under Article 4 of the Panama Law, a private foundation is constituted through a private document, executed by the founder whose signature has to be authenticated by a notary public at the place of constitution. In this case, the relevant document was not executed by the Claimant but by the entity he claims was nominee for him. That is also consistent with the DIFC Foundation Law and Article 17(1) to which I have already referred and Article 19(2)(e) which provides that the Charter must contain a declaration by each Founder requesting the Council to comply with the terms of the Charter. It is therefore the signatories to the relevant documents who constitute the relevant Founders for the purposes both of Panamanian and DIFC law, regardless of any nominee relationship between the signatory and any funder.

10. Counsel for the Claimant could not contend that any of the other Provisional Declarations were affected by this argument about the name of the Founder in any event. As I am against him on his argument on that issue, there is no reason why the Provisional Declarations made on 30 January 2026, which were fully debated then and follow from a proper construction of the documents, should not now be made final declarations in accordance with the draft order submitted by the Defendants.

Other terms of the Order to be made.

11. The other matters which were raised by the Defendants were not seriously the subject of dispute. The orders relating to the DIFC Registrar of Companies and the requirement for the First Defendant to have access to the Foundation’s email address followed from my earlier decisions. The exact form of the order relating to access to the email address was agreed between the parties. The balance of the orders follows the draft submitted by the Defendants, save as set out in the following paragraph.

12. The issue of timing of a council meeting arose and was essentially agreed between the parties in the following sequence:

13. As for costs, the Defendants have succeeded in their applications and costs of the Re- Listing Application should therefore follow the event. Costs are therefore to be paid by the Claimant to the Defendants, to be assessed by the Registrar, if not agreed.