Winding-up control of company assets vests in the Official Liquidator; secured creditor enforcement is deferred at that stage.

After a company is ordered to be wound up, control and possession of its assets vest in the Official Liquidator, and anyone holding those assets must surrender them. A secured creditor cannot, at that stage, continue to retain possession or invoke section 29 of the State Financial Corporations Act to enforce its remedy against the company's assets. An earlier direction for redelivery of attached goods was treated as conditional and did not lift the attachment. Competing claims based on prior charge or attachment were left open for later examination, but they did not prevent immediate delivery of the assets to the Official Liquidator.

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Issues: Whether, after the company had been ordered to be wound up and the Official Liquidator had taken charge, the secured creditor could still exercise its powers under section 29 of the State Financial Corporations Act and retain possession of the company's assets taken pursuant to an attachment before judgment.

Analysis: Once the winding-up order was made and the Official Liquidator assumed charge, the assets of the company in liquidation had to be delivered to the Official Liquidator. A party in possession of such assets had no right to continue retaining them. The earlier order concerning redelivery of the attached goods was understood as operating only on furnishing security and did not amount to lifting the attachment. The court also noted that disputed questions regarding any prior charge in favour of the secured creditor and the effect of attachment would be examined if and when necessary, but those issues did not prevent immediate delivery of the assets to the Official Liquidator.

Conclusion: The secured creditor could not at that stage exercise its powers under section 29 of the State Financial Corporations Act, and the party holding the assets was directed to hand them over to the Official Liquidator within three weeks.

Final Conclusion: The application was allowed only to the extent of securing custody of the company assets with the Official Liquidator, while the request to proceed under section 29 stood declined for the time being.

Ratio Decidendi: After a company is ordered to be wound up, possession and control of its assets vest in the Official Liquidator, and any person holding such assets must surrender them; competing claims of attachment or secured-creditor enforcement do not override that obligation at that stage.

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