ICSI Urges MCA to Extend FY2024-25 Annual Filing Deadline Amid MCA-21 V3 Portal Glitches

The Institute of Company Secretaries of India (ICSI) has recently issued a formal communication to Ms Deepti Gaur Mukerjee, Secretary of the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA), regarding the functioning of the MCA-21 V3 Portal.

In the communication, ICSI has highlighted that the stakeholders are facing issues and challenges while filing their annual returns due to technical glitches in the MCA-21 V3 Portal, contributing to difficulties in compliance under the Companies Act, 2013.

Here is the list of some common issues that are being faced by stakeholders:

• While filing AOC-4, stakeholders are facing difficulty in generating the PDF version of forms after submission; the system is often showing validation errors during form processing. Sometimes the system is downloading the wrong company forms.
• When stakeholders file the AOC-4 XBRL form, the system displays a message reading, “File Validation Failed,” urging users to contact the administrators. The system is not enabling users to upload Form AOC-4 XBRL and Form CSR-2 for the financial year 2024-25.
• Users filing Form MGT-7 are facing difficulties with the portal, like the wrong Excel file being uploaded, and failing to upload.

Professionals have highlighted the following common issues with the MCA-21 V3 Portal:

1. Frequent Slowdowns and Timeouts

• The MCA-21 V3 Portal is experiencing frequent slowdowns during filing annual returns, especially during peak filing hours, i.e., between 3 PM and 8 PM. The due date for MCA annual filings for FY2024-25 is approaching, and the portal is not functioning smoothly.

2. Non-functional Website Access

• Many times, on several occasions, the MCA portal does not function. Users face difficulties even in loading the homepage. If accessed, problems are faced during the filing process, like system errors, timeouts, and site crashes etc.

Other than these, there are other problems too that have been highlighted by professions, as highlighted by ICSI in its communication. Citing all the highlighted issues faced by the stakeholders, ICSI has requested MCA to extend the due date for annual filings for the financial year 2024-25 till December 31, 2025, amid technical glitches in the MCA-21 V3 Portal.