Relief from Statutory Defaults: company relieved from compliance breaches due to seized books, subject to filing adapted statements within two months.

Question whether company and officers should be excused from defaults in complying with statutory accounts and annual return where company books were seized; Court applied the Companies Act power to relieve from liability when circumstances justify relief and recognised that seizure made full statutory compliance impossible. The Court held that adaptation of the annual return form is permitted where full compliance cannot be achieved and therefore granted relief from liability, subject to the condition that the company files within two months statements of income and expenditure and receipts and payments based on maintained accounts and files particulars required by the annual return as nearly as possible.

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Issues: Whether the company and its directors and officers should be relieved from liability for default in complying with sections 210, 220 and 159 of the Companies Act, in respect of the accounts and annual return for the year ending 31 July 1958, on the ground that the company's account books were seized and remain withheld.

Analysis: Section 633 of the Companies Act, 1956 provides the Court power to relieve a company and its officers from liability for default in complying with statutory requirements where circumstances justify relief. The petition alleges that the Special Police Establishment seized the company's account books in November 1953 and that the books remain in custody of the Commission of Inquiry, making proper audit and preparation of balance sheet and profit and loss account for the relevant period impossible. The Registrar did not seriously dispute the seizure and continued withholding of the books, and accepted that full statutory documents could not be produced; however, certain particulars required by section 159 and statements of income and expenditure and receipts and payments based on the accounts maintained by the company could be furnished. Section 159(2) requires the annual return to be in the form set out in Part II of Schedule V or as near thereto as circumstances admit, permitting adaptation where full compliance is impossible.

Conclusion: Relief is granted under section 633 of the Companies Act, 1956 to the company and its directors and officers from liability for default in complying with sections 210, 220 and 159, on the condition that within two months the company files statements of income and expenditure and receipts and payments for the year ending 31 July 1958 based on the accounts now maintained and files the particulars required under section 159 as nearly as possible in conformity with Part II of Schedule V.

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