Striking Off a Company and Reviving It (2026)

How-to · Company Law · Process

Updated for 2026 · Claw Editorial

A company can be removed from the register of companies, and dissolved, under Section 248 of the Companies Act, 2013. This happens either when the Registrar strikes it off for being inactive, or when the company itself applies to close down. A struck-off company can be brought back. An aggrieved person can appeal to the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) within three years, or apply for restoration within twenty years, under Section 252. This guide sets out how strike off works, the effect, and how revival is done. Last verified October 2026.

01When a company is struck off

A company that stops operating often also stops filing. After a point, the Registrar of Companies can remove its name from the register, which dissolves the company. Many directors only discover this when a bank account is frozen, a filing is refused, or a director disqualification follows.

Strike off is not always a problem. A company with no business and no liabilities may want to close cleanly, and the voluntary route exists for that. The trouble comes when a company is struck off while it still has assets, operations or disputes, and needs to be brought back.

02The two routes to strike off

Section 248 provides two routes.

• Registrar’s route, Section 248(1): the Registrar, on reasonable cause, can remove a company’s name. Common grounds are that the company has not commenced business within a year of incorporation, or has not carried on business for two immediately preceding financial years and has not sought dormant status.
• Company’s own route, Section 248(2): a company, after extinguishing its liabilities and passing a special resolution, can itself apply to the Registrar to strike off its name.

The Registrar’s route is the one that catches inactive companies by surprise. The company’s route is a deliberate, voluntary closure.

03The strike-off procedure and forms

The process runs through a set of STK forms under the Companies (Removal of Names of Companies from the Register of Companies) Rules, 2016.

In the Registrar’s route, the company gets a chance to respond to the STK-1 notice before its name is removed. In the voluntary route, the company files Form STK-2 with the prescribed fee and documents.

04What strike off means

On strike off, the company is dissolved and ceases to operate as a company. But some consequences survive, under Section 250:

• the liability of every director, manager, officer and member continues and can be enforced as if the company had not been dissolved;
• the Tribunal can still wind up a company that has been struck off, if needed.

So strike off does not wipe out existing liabilities. This is also why directors of a struck-off defaulting company can face disqualification, which is explained in director disqualification under Section 164.

05Reviving a struck-off company

Revival is done under Section 252 before the NCLT, and there are two routes.

• Appeal, Section 252(1): a person aggrieved by the Registrar’s order of strike off can appeal to the NCLT. If the Tribunal is satisfied the strike off was not justified, it can order the name restored.
• Application for restoration, Section 252(3): the company, or any member, creditor or workman, can apply to the NCLT to restore the name where they are aggrieved by the strike off.

If the NCLT allows it, the company’s name is restored to the register as if it had never been struck off, and the company is then expected to make good its pending filings.

Revival restores the company as if its name had never been struck off, but the Tribunal usually requires all pending filings and fees to be cleared.

06Time limits and who can act

Who can act: for the Section 252(1) appeal, any person aggrieved by the Registrar’s order. For Section 252(3) restoration, the company, or any member, creditor or workman.

Where: the NCLT bench with jurisdiction over the company’s registered office.

Time limits:

• Appeal under Section 252(1): within three years from the date of the Registrar’s order of strike off.
• Restoration under Section 252(3): before the expiry of twenty years from the publication in the Official Gazette of the strike-off notice under Section 248(5).

The filing is usually made in the prescribed NCLT forms (such as a petition in Form NCLT-9 with a supporting affidavit), with the company’s incorporation documents and the audited accounts for the relevant years.

07Where Claw fits

Claw is an all-in-one legaltech platform for Indian advocates, law firms, and corporate legal teams, combining AI-based case search, an AI legal assistant (Legal GPT), case management, and compliance automation across all Indian courts and tribunals.

A revival petition lives or dies on earlier NCLT and NCLAT orders, on whether the company was actually operating, and on how the STK notices were served, points settled across a long run of Tribunal decisions. Claw lets you search those 30 crore+ judgments in under 5 seconds, by party or advocate name, so you can find how a bench has treated a restoration on facts like yours. It also tracks cases, orders and hearings across 9,102 courts, benches and forums, which keeps your own Section 252 matter and its next date in view.

Claw does not use customer case documents to train its AI models, so the accounts and filings behind a revival stay confidential. Create a free Claw account to research restoration rulings and to track a strike-off or revival matter. For a broader search, see case search across Indian courts.

08Sources and further reading

• Ministry of Corporate Affairs (Companies Act, 2013 and STK forms): mca.gov.in
• India Code (Companies Act, 2013, Sections 248 to 252): indiacode.nic.in
• NCLT (National Company Law Tribunal): nclt.gov.in
• Claw: clawlaw.in

This guide is general information, not legal advice. Company law and the NCLT rules change through amendments, so check the current text and take advice from counsel before you act.

09Frequently asked questions