Special Provisions Applicable to a Government Company

The Central Government may, by notification in the Official Gazette, direct that any of the provisions of the Act [other than Sections 618, 619 and 619A] as may be specified therein shall not apply to any government company, or shall apply with such exceptions, modifications and adaptations as may be specified in the notification [Section 620].

In exercise of its power under Section 620, the Central Government has issued notifications modifying the operations of different provisions of the Companies Act to government as under

Memorandum-Name Clause: Section 13 of the Companies Act, 1956 requires that the words ‘private limited’ shall be added to the name of the private limited company. A government company is exempted from having the word ‘private’ as part of its name (vide Notification No. GSR 1234 dated December 30, 1958). So when a company becomes a government company by virtue of shareholding by the government, the board of directors of the government company may decide to have the word ‘private’ omitted from its name. The approval by special resolution is not necessary where the alteration of the name clause consists only in the deletion of word ‘private’ therefrom (vide Notification No. GSR 1649 dated November 13, 1965).

Annual General Meeting - Extension of Time: In terms of Section 166(1) of the Companies Act, 1956, the Registrar of Companies may for a very special reason grant extension of time for holding the annual general meeting (other than the first) by a period not exceeding three months. In the case of a government company, however, the approval of the Central Government instead of the Registrar of Companies is obtained for such extension of time (vide Notification No. SRO.355 dated January 7, 1957 as amended by Notification No. GSR 1473 dated December 16, 1961).

Venue of Meeting: Every annual general meeting of a company must be held at the registered office of the company or at some other place within the city, town or village in which the registered office is situated [Section 166(2)]. The annual general meeting of a government company may, however, be held at such other place as the Central Government may approve instead of being in the same place within the city, town or village in which the registered office of the company is situated vide Notification No. SRO 335 dated January 7, 1957 as amended by Notification No. GSR 1473 dated December 16, 1961).