Company Strike-Off under Section 248 — Defence Strategy.
A strike-off notice does not end the company — but ignoring it does, and quietly.
A promoter receives, or worse fails to notice, a notice in Form STK-1 that the registrar proposes to remove the company from the register under Section 248 — usually after filings have lapsed or the entity has gone dormant. The instinct to let a dormant company simply fall away is often wrong: assets, contracts, and director standing are still attached to it.
A proposed strike-off is a defensible position if it is met in time, and an expensive restoration if it is not. This page sets out how the firm defends a company against removal, and the path to revive one already struck off — protecting the entity’s Sustainable Governance rather than treating its existence as disposable.
How We Defend Against Removal.
The firm reads a strike-off threat as a question of whether the company should survive, not merely how to answer a form. A genuinely defunct shell with no assets or liabilities may be best allowed to lapse or closed deliberately; a company that still holds property, contracts, or live director exposure must be defended, and the two demand opposite responses.
Where the company is to be kept, the defence is built on demonstrating that it is operational or has a legitimate reason to remain — which means curing the filing default that invited the notice and putting the record back in order before the removal takes effect. Speed matters, because the position hardens once the name is actually struck.
- Survival decision Whether the company should be defended and kept or allowed to close deliberately, judged on the assets, contracts, and liabilities still attached to it.
- Notice posture Whether the strike-off is registrar-initiated under Section 248(1) or a voluntary application, since each opens a different response and timeline.
- Default cure The filing and governance lapse that invited the notice, regularised so the company can be shown as compliant and operational.
- Restoration route Where the name has already been struck, the path to revive it before the tribunal and the limited window in which that relief is available.
Restoring a Company Already Struck Off.
Once a company’s name is on the register again the consequences reverse, but restoration is a structured legal pathway with a closing window — not a filing to be made at leisure.
Company Restoration before NCLT — Legal & Compliance Pathway
When a company has been struck off, it ceases to exist as a legal person — yet its assets do not vanish, they vest in abeyance, and its directors do not escape the obligations that attached before removal. Restoration is the mechanism that brings the company back onto the register so that those assets, contracts, and standing are recoverable rather than stranded.
The route runs through the National Company Law Tribunal, which may order restoration where it is satisfied the company was operational at the time of removal or that restoration is otherwise just. The applicant must show a legitimate basis — ongoing business, assets to be protected, a pending claim — and must be prepared to regularise the filing defaults that led to the strike-off as a condition of being restored. Crucially, the relief is time-bound: the right to seek restoration is not open indefinitely.
The firm treats restoration as a governance reconstruction rather than a tribunal errand. The objective is not only to revive the name but to return the company to a defensible compliance standing in the same motion, so that a company restored at cost is not one drifting back toward the next removal. The procedural mechanics of the application are subordinate to that aim, not the point of it.
Where the company is being recovered as a step toward a sale or wind-down rather than continued operation, the tax treatment of that eventual exit is a distinct discipline — exit tax and capital gains structuring for investors sits outside this page’s scope and is covered in full there.
What Removal Sets in Motion.
A strike-off left unmet, or a restoration done narrowly, carries consequences well beyond the company’s name on a register.
Asset Exposure
On removal the company’s assets and bank balances are frozen and vest pending restoration, putting recoverable value at risk the longer the position is left.
Director Standing
Strike-off following filing default frequently coincides with disqualification of the directors, compounding the removal with a personal consequence that travels to their other boards.
Contractual Continuity
Live contracts, licences, and claims held in the company’s name lose their counterparty on removal, so a defence preserves relationships a late restoration must then rebuild.