Two decades on, man gets dues from closed firm

Vijay C Roy

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 17

Yamunanagar’s Nar Singh (55) never thought that he would get his dues from a closed paper mill with which he worked around 24 years back. Now after more than 25 years, Nar Singh will get Rs 37,132 dues.

Same is the example of Swarn Singh (53 years), a Sirmour district resident. Swarn worked for the closed paper mill for 10 years. Although he didn’t remember his last drawn salary but got Rs 17,381 dues.

Both Nar and Swarn are among over a half dozen of workers who submitted their claims after the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) invited these from workers. They will get their dues after more than 20 years along with other creditors of closed Kala Amb-based Kanwar Papers, which went for liquidation over two decades ago. The total dues to be distributed among the workers are around Rs 8.20 lakh.

Kanwar Papers was incorporated on January 14,1981. The company closed its operations in 1994.

According to Dr Raj Singh, Official Liquidator (Himachal Pradesh), who took up the case for early dissolution of the company, said, “In 1988, the company approached the Board for Industrial and Financial Reconstruction and wanted to be declared as a sick unit. The matter was referred to the Himachal Pradesh High Court and it passed winding up order in 1999.

The sale of the assets of the company was conducted in 2005. The total amount recovered from the sale of the assets was Rs 2.16 crore.

“The amount was lying with the High Court, accruing the interest rate, it became Rs 5.08 crore. Last year, we approached the High Court and asked it to release the amount so that dissolution process was completed. Acting on our request, the High Court released the total amount. Now we are in the process of distributing the amount to its creditors, employees and other government departments,” he added.