Ministry of Corporate Affairs 12,889 shell companies struck off in FY 2020-21 Posted On: 03 AUG 2021 6:41PM by PIB Delhi There is no definition of the term “Shell Company” in the Companies Act. It normally refers to a company without active business operation or significant assets, which in some cases are used for illegal purpose such as tax evasion, money laundering, obscuring ownership, benami properties etc. This was stated by Union Minister of State for Corporate Affairs Shri Rao Inderjit Singh in a written reply to a question in Rajya Sabha today. On the identification shell companies, the Minister stated that the Special Task Force set up by the Government to look into the issue of “Shell Companies” has inter-alia recommended the use of certain red flag indicators as alerts for identification of Shell Companies. Giving more details, the Minister stated that the Government has undertaken a Special Drive for identification and strike off of Companies by invoking the provisions of section 248 (1) of the Act by which the Registrar of Companies (RoC) struck off those companies after following the due process of law from the Register of companies when RoC has reasonable cause to believe that those companies are not carrying on any business or operation for a period of two immediately preceding financial years and has not made any application within such period for obtaining the status of a dormant company under section 455. The Minister listed the total number of companies struck off u/s 248 State/Union Territory-wise as under: Sate/ UT-wise 2018-19 2019-20 2020-21 Gujarat 6398 2494 257 Andaman 24 15 2 Karnataka 4171 5568 1038 UT of Chandigarh 3514 893 501 Tamil Nadu and Coimbatore 9107 3214 1322 Orissa 2907 719 78 NCT of Delhi and Haryana 30544 12653 2396 Kerala 2801 5339 977 Goa 250 311 36 Madhya Pradesh 3386 1168 111 Himachal Pradesh 481 176 201 Telangana 16364 2686 730 Rajasthan 4038 4466 507 Jammu and Kashmir 255 138 0 Jharkhand 1306 403 139 Uttar Pradesh 7589 5821 1936 West Bengal 8390 6627 5 Maharashtra (Mumbai and Pune) 47575 7824 2298 Bihar 2540 1956 185 UT of Puducherry 37 117 35 Assam, Tripura, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Mizoram, Meghalaya, 372 796 88 Manipur, and Sikkim Uttarakhand 476 79 0 Andhra Pradesh 3864 958 0 Chhattisgarh 539 347 47 Grand Total 156928 64768 12889 **** RM/KMN (Release ID: 1741989).