A company that skips INC-20A cannot legally commence any business activity or exercise borrowing powers, full stop. That is not a soft warning, it is what Section 10A of the Companies Act says outright, and banks routinely decline to activate full account facilities for a company that has not filed it.
The fix is straightforward once you know the rule: file within 180 days of incorporation, after your bank account is open and every subscriber has paid in their share capital. LegalX India handles that filing for newly incorporated companies across Chennai, from an OMR based SaaS entity to a commercial firm registered near Anna Nagar, for ₹1,499.
This is a Tamil Nadu wide rule under a national statute, so it applies the same way whether your registered office sits in Guindy, Ambattur or any other part of the state. What differs for a Chennai company is only the registrar, ROC Chennai, that ends up receiving the filing based on the TN state code in your CIN.
Is your newly incorporated company actually covered by INC-20A?
If your company has share capital and was incorporated on or after November 2, 2018, INC-20A applies to you, regardless of how small the paid up capital is. Section 8 companies, which do not carry share capital in the relevant sense, are the one clear exemption.
An OPC incorporated after that date is not exempt either, contrary to what some first time founders assume. The obligation attaches to the entity type having share capital, not to how many directors or shareholders it has, so a Tamil Nadu registered OPC files INC-20A exactly like a private limited company does.
What proof does ROC Chennai expect before it accepts this filing?
ROC Chennai will not accept this filing at all without the following documents already on hand:
- Certificate of Incorporation showing the exact date the 180 day clock started
- Memorandum of Association and Articles of Association
- A bank statement showing share capital received from every subscriber named in the MOA
- Valid Digital Signature Certificates for all directors
- Director Identification Numbers for every director on record
The bank statement is where most delays start. Subscribers sometimes transfer funds from an account whose name does not exactly match their name in the MOA, which creates a mismatch that has to be resolved before the form can be filed cleanly.
How is the 180 day window measured from incorporation?
INC-20A is due within 180 days from the date of incorporation shown on your Certificate of Incorporation. There is no extension mechanism built into the rule for a delayed bank account opening or a slow subscriber.
The 180 day count begins the day the Registrar issues the certificate, not the day your bank account is finally opened or the day the last subscriber transfers funds. A company that takes 90 days just to get its bank account operational has effectively halved its own filing window without the deadline itself moving at all.
What is the financial exposure if this filing slips?
| Detail | Requirement |
|---|---|
| Company penalty | ₹50,000 flat |
| Penalty per officer in default | ₹1,000 per day, up to ₹1,00,000 |
| Consequence of continued non filing | Registrar can initiate strike off proceedings |
| Business activity before filing | Not legally permitted |
The officer penalty compounds daily with no early cap the way ADT-1's does. A founder who discovers the missed deadline three months late is already facing a meaningfully large individual exposure on top of the flat company fee.
What are the actual steps once you engage us?
- You share your incorporation date, director details and share subscription status.
- We verify your bank account setup and check that share capital receipt matches the MOA.
- Our team prepares Form INC-20A and cross checks every field against your documents.
- Directors digitally sign using their DSC, and we submit on MCA V3 under ROC Chennai.
- You receive the SRN and official acknowledgement once the filing is approved.
Most filings complete in 2 to 3 working days once documents are ready, though we quote 3 to 5 days to account for any bank statement mismatch that needs a quick correction first. Chennai companies that keep their subscriber names, bank account names and MOA entries consistent from day one rarely see any correction cycle at all.
Where does INC-20A usually trip up Chennai founders?
An OMR based SaaS company raising a small seed round is a common case. Investor funds sometimes land in the company account before the founders have properly registered the incorporation with their bank branch. That creates a naming mismatch that stalls verification right when the founders are focused entirely on product, not paperwork.
A trading or commercial firm near Anna Nagar shows a different pattern. These companies sometimes incorporate months before actually opening for business, and by the time trading starts, nobody remembers that INC-20A was still pending from the original incorporation date. The 180 day window does not pause for a business that has not started operating yet. We have seen this play out with a firm that incorporated in December to lock in a business name. It then spent four months finalising a lease before opening its doors, only to discover the 180 day window had already closed a few weeks earlier.
What happens after you hand LegalX India your Chennai INC-20A filing?
We have filed enough of these to know the two failure points before they cause a rejection. One is a bank statement that does not match subscriber names in the MOA, and the other is a founder who assumes the 180 days start when the business actually opens rather than from incorporation itself.
Our team checks both before we submit anything to ROC Chennai, and every filing goes out through MCA V3 with an SRN you can verify. For the national rules behind this requirement, read INC-20A filing across India. Share your Certificate of Incorporation with us and we will tell you exactly how many days remain on your clock.