Ravinthran a/l Paramaguru

On the judicial record

An appellate judge whose reported corpus spans contract-illegality and company appeals, criminal appeals including attempted trafficking, and family and technology-contract disputes.

Justice Ravinthran a/l Paramaguru sits in the Court of Appeal (Mahkamah Rayuan), and the reported decisions in this corpus span commercial, criminal, company and family appeals. Contract illegality is a recurring theme: several appeals concern sale-and-purchase agreements alleged to be sham transactions disguising an unlicensed moneylending arrangement contrary to the Moneylenders Act 1951, and the effect that such illegality has on enforceability. Company and insolvency questions feature, including whether a board resolution passed shortly before winding up amounted to an undue preference under section 528 of the Companies Act 2016, and appeals concerning an application for leave to convene a meeting of a scheme of creditors.

Criminal appeals are well represented. They include an appeal against a conviction under section 26C of the Anti-Trafficking in Persons and Anti-Smuggling of Migrants Act, argued on the footing that the appellant was denied a fair opportunity on the admissibility of an investigation statement, and an appeal concerning an attempt to traffic in a dangerous drug under section 33 of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952, which required the appellant to have taken substantial steps manifesting the intent to commit the offence.

The corpus also reaches family, land and technology-contract disputes — an application to set aside a decree nisi made absolute on the ground that substituted service was invalid, the power of a State authority when approving a proposed conversion and sub-division of land and reducing its tenure from perpetuity to a term of years, and a dispute over the design and development of a mobile application, payment gateway and related change requests. The lifting of the corporate veil is examined where companies operated as a single unified entity to conceal facts or evade obligations. The corpus reflects an appellate judge working across the commercial and criminal spectrum with sustained attention to questions of illegality and enforceability.