Assistant Commissioner Of Central GST & Central Excise vs Resolution Professional (Smt. J Karthiga)

Oral Judgment : Justice Sharad Kumar Sharma, Member (Judicial):

This Company Appeal (AT) (CH) (INS) No. 564 / 2025 is accompanied with a delay condonation in re-filing being Re-filing Application IA No. 1591 / 2025 where the Appellant has sought a condonation of 14 days of delay that has chanced in preferring the Appeal.

After having heard the Ld. Counsel for the Appellant and being satisfied with the reasons given in the application for delay condonation in re-filing of the Company Appeal, the delay of 14 days that has chanced in preferring the Appeal would hereby stand condoned. Accordingly, IA No. No. 1591 / 2025, would stand allowed.

Heard Ld. Counsel for the Appellant on the Company Appeal (AT) (CH) (INS) No. 564 / 2025 itself.

The Company Appeal has been preferred by the Appellant, being aggrieved as against the impugned order of 29.11.2023 as passed by the Ld. NCLT, Chennai Bench, in IA (IBC) / 1638 / CHE / 2023 as preferred in CP / 1006 / IB / 2018, by invocation of the provisions contained under Section 60 (5) of I & B Code, 2016, wherein the Appellant had prayed for that the rejection made, to the claim of the Applicant by the Respondent by the letter of 28.07.2023, to be declared as to be illegal and void and further have sought a direction to admit the claim.

But the facts, which are borne out from the record, that itself is self-explanatory to the justification of the impugned judgment that has been rendered by the Ld. Tribunal, because, as per the finding recorded and it is not in dispute also, that the Resolution Plan has already been approved by the Committee of Creditors, as back as on 21.12.2020, that thereafter the Resolution Professional had filed an interlocutory application before the Ld. Tribunal seeking approval of the Ld. Adjudicating Authority, which too stood granted, and as affirmed by the Counsel the approval of the Resolution Plan has attained finality.

At no point of time either in the proceedings before the Ld. Adjudicating Authority or before the present Appellate Tribunal, it is the case of the Appellant that he didn’t had the knowledge of the proceedings of the CIRP, which has been carried before the Ld. Adjudicating Authority. Even otherwise also, if we scrutinize the controversy from the view point of the provisions of Section 15 of the I & B Code, 2016, which prescribes for making of a public announcement of the Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process, it is to held that once the Resolution Process has been pronounced and made public in accordance with the procedures, have been prescribed therein to by publication in Form A of Schedule I of Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (Resolution Process for Corporate Persons), Regulations 2016, the presumption would be that everyone including the Appellant did have a deeming knowledge of the CIRP process.

The factum of public announcement as per the provisions under Section 15 of I & B Code, 2016, along with Regulation 6 of the Regulation of 2016, is an unrebutted fact and in that eventuality, when the Appellant has not filed the claim, they cannot now claim an ignorance of the process of commencement of the CIRP.

Filing of an application of a claim at a belated stage would be contrary to the very spirit of the provisions of law, which contemplates the closure of the CIRP process within a specified time frame where time becomes the essence of the entire proceedings, because under the given set of circumstances as involved in the instant Company Appeal, the Plan cannot be put back, for reconsideration on account of belated filing of claims due to slackness or lack of diligence of the Appellant, which would be an endless process, more particularly when the plan already stood approved by the Committee of Creditors, as back as on 21.12.2020.

The Applicant filed a claim for the first time before the Resolution Professional only on 28.07.2023 i.e. much later than the date of approval of Plan. It is on the basis of the belated raising of the claim, the Application preferred by the Appellant has been rejected in the light of the ratio as referred to therein laid down by the Principal Bench in the matter of M/s. RPS Infrastructure Limited, wherein the ratio stipulates that, when the Plan has already been approved, a person cannot be permitted to jump into the proceedings by filing a belated claim by submission of Form B, in order to facilitate a de novo consideration of their claim.

As far as the finding, which has been recorded by the Ld. Tribunal, it is not been disputed that the Resolution Plan has already been approved and the claim preferred before the Resolution Professional by the Appellant was at a much belated stage only on 28.07.2023. Since, there is no factual dispute in the Company Appeal in itself and the Application has been rejected because of filing of the Claim at a much belated stage by the Appellant, the same cannot be permitted to be considered at this stage nor the order of rejection of the claim could be declared to be illegal.

Thus, the Company Appeal (AT) (CH) (INS) No. 564 / 2025 (with defects) lacks merit and the same is accordingly dismissed. The connected pending Interlocutory Applications, if any, would stand closed.