MCA extends company filing deadlines for FY26; financial statements due by December 31, annual returns by January 31

The Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) has extended the deadlines for companies to file financial statements and annual returns for the financial year 2025-26, allowing businesses additional time to complete mandatory statutory compliances without paying additional fees.

Under the revised schedule, companies can file financial statements through various versions of Form AOC-4, including consolidated financial statements, XBRL-format filings and applicable forms for non-banking financial companies, by December 31, 2026, without additional fees.

The deadline for filing annual returns through Forms MGT-7 and MGT-7A has been extended to January 31, 2027, according to an MCA circular.

The decision follows representations from stakeholders seeking more time to complete the mandatory filings, amid technical difficulties affecting the MCA-21 Version 3 portal, the online platform used by companies to submit statutory documents and access corporate compliance services.

ICSI flags portal glitches, seeks deadline extension

The Institute of Company Secretaries of India (ICSI) had also requested an extension until December 31, 2026, without additional fees, citing persistent technical problems with the online filing system.

The difficulties reportedly included frequent portal outages, slow response times, session timeouts and automatic logouts while users prepared and submitted forms. Other issues included login problems, delays in profile updates and user access management, errors in pre-filled information and inconsistencies in data retrieval.

The extension provides companies and compliance professionals additional time to complete the required submissions while navigating the challenges associated with the online filing infrastructure.

What companies need to know about the revised deadlines

Form AOC-4 is used to submit a company's financial statements to the Registrar of Companies. Form MGT-7 is used for filing annual returns, while Form MGT-7A is applicable to one-person companies and small companies.

The two sets of filings serve different statutory purposes, making it important for companies to track the revised deadlines separately. While the financial statement filing deadline is December 31, 2026, the annual return deadline falls a month later, on January 31, 2027.

The ministry had also extended annual filing deadlines for the previous financial year, 2024-25, through circulars issued in October and December 2025.

The latest relief is intended to give companies more time to complete their FY26 filings without incurring additional fees, as concerns over the performance of the MCA-21 Version 3 portal continue to affect the compliance process.