OFFICIAL LIQUIDATOR OF MERCARA CURERS PRIVATE LIMITED (IN LIQN) Vs. KARNATAKA STATE INDUSTRIAL INVESTMENT AND DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION LIMITED REP. BY ITS DY. MANAGER AND REFCO INVESTMENT SERVICES PRIVATE LIMITED REP. BY ITS SPECIAL POWER OF ATTO

JUDGEMENT

(1.) EVEN at the initial stages of this appeal, we did entertain a doubt as to the tenability of the appeal filed under Section 483 of the Companies Act, 1956 [for short, the Act], for the reason that the appeal was against the orders passed by the learned Company Judge functioning as a Company Court and the appellant being the Official Liquidator, who incidentally also happens to be the Official Liquidator attached to the Court when the Company Court is supervising the winding up proceedings of a Company which has been ordered to be wound up by the very Court.

(2.) IN view of the position of the Official Liquidator, who is virtually a limb of the Company Court and the order that is questioned being the order of the Company Court itself, we entertained a doubt as to whether the Official Liquidator, who is part of the Court itself, can turn around and question the legality of the order passed by the Company.

(3.) MR . Deepak has also drawn our attention to the provisions of Section 457 indicating the powers of the liquidator. Mr. Deepak would submit that even while the Official Liquidator acts as a limb of the Company Court, he also has the dual responsibility of representing the Company under liquidation, which though has been ordered to be wound up, nevertheless retains its independent and distinct identity as a legal person being a Company and having not yet gone out of existence and in such circumstances, if it is found that there is a need for filing an appeal against an order, having regard to the duty cast on the Official Liquidator to protect the Company which he represents, such an appeal can definitely be filed in terms of Section 483 of the Act, a substantive provision enabling any aggrieved person to file an appeal and therefore, the appeal is very much tenable.