The New Delhi bench of the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal( NCLAT ) in the matter of Everest Pharmaceutics Pvt Ltd., directed the Secretary of Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) to Conduct an inquiry on the matter of parties approaching the tribunal with fabricated documents.
The appellant challenged the order passed by the National Company Law Tribunal,(NCLT) wherein the appeal preferred by the Appellant under Section 252 (3) of the Companies Act, 2013 was dismissed.
The Appellant submitted that the name of the aforesaid company is incorrectly shown as Everest Pharmaceuticals Private Limited in the register(s)/records/master data maintained by the Registrar of Companies (West Bengal), Kolkata and needed to be rectified/corrected by them.
The Registrar of Companies, West Bengal, ie. the Respondent, struck off the Company’s name from the Register due to failure in filing the Financial Statements and Annual Return from the financial years ending 31.03.2000 till 31.03.2019.
It was submitted that the Company was unable to comply with its statutory filings due to the critical health condition of Mr Tapan Dhar, the Key Managerial Personnel KMP), one of the Directors of the struck-off Company since 2017.
The Appellant contended that the Company was carrying on its business and was in operation at the time of striking off of its name. It has been further pleaded that the delay in filing the annual return of the company was not deliberate as the same was the result of an inadvertent mistake and the company was unable to comply with its statutory returns due to being kept occupied with the critical health conditions of Mr Tapan Dhar, the KMP and one of the Directors of the struck off company for an elongated period
It was evident that in the year 1985 land measuring 5 cottahs more or less in Sector-V, Bidhannagar was offered/allotted to the appellant company on lease for 999 years and the appellant/allottee was asked to produce certain documents.
While dismissing the appeal, the Coram Comprising Justice Rakesh Kumar, Member (Judicial) and Dr Alok Srivastava, Member (Technical) observed that certain documents particularly Auditors report etc. have been brought on record in the judicial proceeding which prima facie creates serious doubts regarding their genuineness in the mind of the Court it would not be appropriate to simply shut our eyes on such issues. Further noted that in a number of court proceedings, the parties are coming with fabricated documents.
The NCLAT directed to conduct a detailed enquiry/investigation to ascertain the veracity of aforesaid documents which have been brought on record in the appeal particularly director’s report/auditors’ reports/Balance sheets.
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