Businesses will have to make their most important statutory filings, especially annual returns, financial statements and cost audit reports, in the revamped and web-based forms in the government’s portal from 14 July.
The revamped version of the ministry of corporate affairs portal—MCA21—is highly tech-driven and AI-enabled to improve the security of filings and to enable real-time verification of the data being entered.
These 38 key statutory forms, including 13 annual filing forms and six audit forms, are the final set of company forms to be migrated to the new format, said an official announcement. This will complete the revamp of the MCA21 portal. These were not included among those migrated last year as the government did not want the annual return filing cycle to be disrupted by technical glitches during the transition.
India has over 1.8 million active companies. Making the forms available in July gives businesses ample time to familiarise with the new format this year.
Companies have six months from the end of a financial year to hold their annual general meeting and then one month to file their financial statements and 60 days from the AGM to file annual returns.
The web-based forms replace PDF forms for improved user experience and more efficient regulatory monitoring of businesses.
The rebuilt filing portal allows authorities to detect financial stress and governance lapses in companies at an early stage and take remedial action. Also, defaults in compliance with certain statutory obligations may be automatically flagged to companies for rectification.
Forms for reporting appointment, removal and resignation of statutory auditors, disclosure of related parties, corporate social responsibility and investor complaints are among the 38 now being migrated to the new version.
Efficient regulatory filings
Since the revamped MCA21 portal (version three or V3) allows filling the forms directly online, the transition to it is expected to bring considerable advantages for both businesses and professionals by way of improved user interface, more accuracy, and enhanced data security, said Sandeep Sehgal, partner-tax at AKM Global, a tax and consulting firm.
“Complete transition to the V3 portal will also help streamline compliance processes, making regulatory filings faster and more efficient,” Sehgal said. “Once the complete integration of MCA forms is completed on one platform, it will further strengthen the regulatory ecosystem by enabling better data integration and thus helping build a more connected and responsive compliance environment.”
Two-factor authentication required in the new forms makes it impossible to file a company document without the registered user coming to know about it, helping prevent fraud, Mint reported on 1 July last year. The ministry has also replaced the requirement of obtaining the Registrar of Companies (RoC) approvals for several corporate disclosures with just an online acknowledgement of the filing to be considered compliant.
The upgraded system enables RoCs to conduct data analytics efficiently and detect compliance breaches.
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