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2024 (2) TMI 510 - NATIONAL COMPANY LAW APPELLATE TRIBUNAL , PRINCIPAL BENCH , NEW DELHIRevival of the Appellant / Company - Removal the company for non-filing of Annual Return - Going Concern or not - Misinterpretation of meaning and ‘purport of Liberty’ granted to the Appellant - disregard by Tribunal of clear liberty granted to the Appellant by the Hon’ble High Court, by holding that since the Company petition was not pending, there was no question of receiving additional documents in a disposed of petition/proceeding - HELD THAT:- The power of a Tribunal to permit ‘Additional’ evidence to produce / documents is in the jurisdiction of the Appellate Authority. A document not relevant for deciding the question of controversy in a given proceeding / suit is not to be accepted as additional evidence. Also, if there is any gap or lacuna in evidence to be filled up, the discretionary power conferred upon the Appellate Authority does not authorise the ‘Appellate Authority’ to fill the gap in question. The ‘Tribunal / Court of Law’ is to see whether the Petitioner/Appellant lacked due diligence to be seen, and he cannot be allowed to fill up the ‘lacuna’ at the belated stage. Moreover, the production of additional evidence is not to be permitted where a person does not satisfy the Tribunal / Court that such evidence was not within the knowledge or could not be produced with due diligence. Even though in the present case, the Appellant has come out with a reason that the Petitioner/Appellant had engaged a Part Time Employee to file the Annual Return before the ‘Registrar of Companies’ and that because of the reason unknown to the Appellant, the said employee left and therefore, the Return could not be filed on time for the financial years 2016-2017 and 2017-18 and by the time it came to the knowledge of the Appellant/Petitioner Company, his name was already struck off from the register maintained by the ‘Registrar of Companies’, the Tribunal, in CP(Appeal) No.69/CTB/2020 on 21.08.2020, at para No.11 had clearly observed that ‘before striking off the name of the company from its register, ROC, had issued a show cause notice to the Company enquiring whether the said Company was carrying any business or was in operation’. This ‘Tribunal’, on going through the impugned order dated 08.08.2023 in CA 15/CB/2023 in CP/69/CTB/2020 is of the considered view that the Appellant had not filed CA 15/CB/2023 in CP/69/CTB/2020 within the two years period as envisaged under Section 420 (2) of the Companies Act, 2013 and in fact had filed the CA 15/CB/2023 in CP/69/CTB/2020 before the ‘Tribunal’ 16.12.2022, after the lapse of two years’ period on 16.12.2022. Therefore, the ‘Tribunal’ had rightly opined that the CA 15/CB/2023 was not to be considered in regard to the receiving of additional documents / additional evidence. Appeal dismissed.
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