Make Indore Bench Of NCLT Functional At Least For 2 Days A Week: Madhya Pradesh High Court To Centre

The Madhya Pradesh High Court has asked the Centre to leave no stone unturned to make the Indore Bench of National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) functional at least for two days a week.

The Bench of Justice Sujoy Paul and Justice Pranay Verma said this taking into account the fact that the litigants and lawyers of the jurisdiction are required to travel all the way to Ahmedabad, as the Indore bench of NCLT isn't functional yet.

Essentially, it was submitted by counsel for the petitioner that the Bench of NCLT was directed to be constituted at Indore by notification dated 08.03.2019, however, to date, the notification could not be translated into reality.

In the result, it was submitted, the litigants and lawyers of this jurisdiction are required to travel all the way to Ahmedabad and at Ahmedabad also, the hearing does not take place on regular basis.

It was further submitted before the Court that it is a tiring and costly affair for the litigants and lawyers and thus, the appropriate directions were sought for the opening of the Tribunal at least for two days in a week at Indore forthwith.

It was also argued that the matters were not heard in the Ahmedabad bench and in this backdrop, rather than sending the lawyers and litigants to Ahmedabad, an ad hoc basis arrangement may be made so that the matters can be taken up at least two days in a week at Indore.

Faced with this, the counsel for the Union Of India informed that the complete infrastructure of the NCLT Bench at Indore is already ready, and the appropriate authority had also selected a person to be appointed as a member (technical) for Indore Bench.

However, it was submitted, later on, the said member declined to join, and thus, the process to select a new person is going on.

Therefore, granting time to the Union to seek instructions that how much time is likely to take to appoint a new member, the Court expected that respondent will leave no stone unturned to make the Indore Bench NCLT functional at least for two days in a week.

The matter has now been listed for hearing on 10th January, 2022.

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