For a condone delay application to be validly instituted under Section 61(2) of IBC, it must be accompanied by the requisite court fee at the time of filing; payment at a later stage does not relate back to the original filing date.

ORDER

(Hybrid Mode)

24.04.2026:

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

1.These two company appeals have been filed under peculiar circumstances. Owing to the tenacity of arguments extended by the Ld. Counsels for the parties, we are bound to deal with each and every aspect of the case and particularly the aspect of limitation which has been the core contention, while deciding the company appeals.

2. A brief narration of dates becomes relevant, before we appreciate the respective arguments and record our findings on the same.

3. As per the Appellant’ counsel, he contends the following: -

(i) The common impugned order under challenge for both the company appeals is that of 31.10.2025.

(ii) The Appellant admittedly applied for the certified copy of the impugned order on 07.11.2025, which was made available by the Registry of the Ld. NCLT on 10.11.2025 and was issued to the Appellant on 18.11.2025.

(iii) The Appellant filed the respective Appeals on 14.12.2025, on the 44^th day from 31.10.2025, which is the date of pronouncement of the impugned order.

(iv) After accounting for the time taken for obtaining the certified copy of the order which as per the Appellant, is 12 days (07.11.2025 to 18.11.2025), the delay in filing the respective appeals is only of 2 days which may be condoned.

4. The Ld. Counsel for the Respondents objects to the same, contending that the delay should not be condoned as the respective appeals were not filed on 14.12.2025 and were filed at a much later date and that the documents which were filed on 14.12.2025 will not qualify to be Appeal documents in accordance with the provisions of Rule 22 of NCLAT Rules. This is strongly denied by the Appellant’s counsel stating that the appeals were indeed filed on 14.12.2025, that certain clerical mistakes were committed by his office which were subsequently rectified on 11.01.2026 and such mistakes, being procedural in nature, should not make the appeal booklets filed on 14.12.2025 as inadmissible. At this juncture, the issue to be determined in respect of each appeal is as to whether the records, which were e-filed by the Appellant in the shape of the company appeals, by e-filing of the same before the Registry of this Appellate Tribunal on 14.12.2025, could at all be said to be in consonance with Rule 22 of the NCLAT Rules, 2016 .

CA (AT) (CH) (Ins) No. 90/2026:

5. According to the Appellant, he submits that, admittedly there had been certain procedural infirmity on part of the chambers of the Ld. Counsel when they had uploaded the spare copy of the company appeal (which was unsigned) on the website of NCLAT, that realizing the mistake, the correct copy of the memorandum of appeal was uploaded on 11.01.2026 and that there is no difference between the copy of the booklet uploaded on 14.12.2025 and 11.01.2026 and hence the date of e-filing of the Appeal should be taken as 14.12.2025.

6. This has been argued otherwise by the Ld. Counsel for the Respondent; he contends that, only a part of the appeal records was uploaded by way of e-filing on 14.12.2025, that supplying of partial documents / records will not satisfy the ingredients required to be satisfied under Rule 22 of the NCLAT Rules, 2016 , and hence the said filing of documents cannot be treated as filing of the company appeal. He has further stated that even the records uploaded on 11.01.2026 may not satisfy the conditions contained under Rule 22 of the NCLAT Rules, 2016 , since requisite fees for the condone delay ap