Case: BABULAL VARDHARJI GURJAR Vs. VEER GURJAR ALUMINIUM INDUSTRIES PVT LTD. MR. SUNDRARAJAN DEVANATHAN, IRP LTD. AND ANOTHER

1. Appeal admitted. 2. Heard learned counsel for the parties. 3. This appeal takes exception to the judgment and order dated 17.09.2018 passed by the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal at New Delhi, in Company Appeal (AT) (Insolvency) No. 549/2018. 4. The National Company Law Appellate Tribunal dismissed the appeal preferred by the appellant against the order passed by the National Company Law Tribunal, Mumbai admitting the application bearing No. CP (IB) - 488/I & BP/MB/2018 vide order dated 09.08.2018. 5. For the nature of order that we propose to pass, it is not necessary to reproduce the factual matrix of the case. Suffice it to observe that the respondent filed the aforementioned Company Petition before the National Company Law Tribunal under Section 7 of the I.& B. Code. The same was admitted on 09.08.2018 and consequential directions came to be issued in the matter. In the appeal preferred before the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal, one of the grounds agitated in the appeal memo was that the claim of the respondent was admittedly barred by time. For, admittedly, the default was committed on 08.07.2011 whereas the petition had been filed in March 2018. 6. Although, we find that the ground articulated in the appeal memo is vague, but, as the objection regarding limitation goes to the root of the matter and touches upon the jurisdiction of the National Company Law Tribunal to proceed with the claim of the respondent; and since the recent decision of this Court in B.K. Educational Services Pvt. Ltd. Vs. Paras Gupta & Associates - AIR 2018 SC 5601 has held that the question of limitation is applicable even to applications filed under Section 7 of the I.& B. Code, it would be just and necessary to answer the said objection appropriately, in accordance with law. 7. Indisputably, neither the National Company Law Tribunal nor the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal, in the present case, has examined the said contention. Indeed, according to the respondent, the plea of claim being barred by limitation is unstatable and, to buttress this argument, the respondent has relied upon the entries in the books of account of the appellant and other related documents. However, that is a matter which ought to be agitated before the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal in the first place.

Decision reasoning: 1[ds]6. Although, we find that the ground articulated in the appeal memo is vague, but, as the objection regarding limitation goes to the root of the matter and touches upon the jurisdiction of the National Company Law Tribunal to proceed with the claim of the respondent; and since the recent decision of this Court in B.K. Educational Services Pvt. Ltd. Vs. Paras Gupta & Associates - AIR 2018 SC 5601 has held that the question of limitation is applicable even to applications filed under Section 7 of the I.& B. Code, it would be just and necessary to answer the said objection appropriately, in accordance with law.7. Indisputably, neither the National Company Law Tribunal nor the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal, in the present case, has examined the said contention. Indeed, according to the respondent, the plea of claim being barred by limitation is unstatable and, to buttress this argument, the respondent has relied upon the entries in the books of account of the appellant and other related documents. However, that is a matter which ought to be agitated before the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal in the first place.