A parliamentary panel has recommended establishing specialised insolvency benches within India’s National Company Law Tribunal to expedite case disposal and address the mounting insolvency workload threatening broader company law functions.
A parliamentary committee has urged the creation of dedicated insolvency benches within the National Company Law Tribunal to speed up case disposal and prevent company law work from being sidelined as the tribunal’s bankruptcy docket expands. According to the panel’s report on the functioning of India’s tribunal system, insolvency now accounts for more than half of the NCLT’s workload, putting strain on its judicial and administrative capacity.
The recommendation, set out by the Department-Related Parliamentary Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law and Justice, calls on the corporate affairs ministry to examine whether separate IBC benches or verticals can be set up with enough judicial and technical members, registry support and infrastructure. The committee said such a structure would help ensure quicker decisions on insolvency while allowing the tribunal to continue giving proper attention to mergers, amalgamations, corporate governance and shareholder protection under the Companies Act, 2013.
The tribunal told the committee that its sanctioned strength of 62 members has remained unchanged since it was created, even as its jurisdiction widened sharply after the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016 came into force. As of July 13, the NCLT was operating with the President, 26 judicial members and 25 technical members, with some posts still vacant. The panel also noted that more than 95% of the tribunal’s workforce is on contractual terms, warning that reliance on deputation and short-term staff weakens continuity and institutional memory.
The latest call for dedicated insolvency benches follows a strong quarter for the tribunal. In July, the NCLT said it had approved 78 resolution plans worth Rs 5,517.66 crore in the June quarter, describing it as its best first-quarter performance since the IBC was enacted. The committee said staffing and bench strength should be reviewed regularly as caseloads grow, a sign that the tribunal’s expanded role is now testing the balance between speed in insolvency and its wider company-law mandate.
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