Apex Infra Limited is a listed public company. The company had declared a final dividend @ 12% on its equity shares of face value 10 each at its…

According to section 124 (1) of the Companies Act, 2013, where a dividend has been declared by a company but has not been paid or claimed within thirty days from the date of the declaration to any shareholder entitled to the payment of the dividend, the company shall, within seven days from the date of expiry of the said period of thirty days, transfer the total amount of dividend which remains unpaid or unclaimed to a special account to be opened by the company in that behalf in any scheduled bank to be called the Unpaid Dividend Account. According to section 124 (5) , any money transferred to the Unpaid Dividend Account of a company in pursuance of this section which remains unpaid or unclaimed for a period of seven years from the date of such transfer shall be transferred by the company along with interest accrued, if any, thereon to the Fund established under sub-section (1) of section 125 and the company shall send a statement in the prescribed form of the details of such transfer to the authority which administers the said Fund and that authority shall issue a receipt to the company as evidence of such transfer. According to section 124 (6) , all shares in respect of which dividend has not been paid or claimed for seven consecutive years or more shall be transferred by the company in the name of Investor Education and Protection Fund along with a statement containing such details as may be prescribed. As per the explanation to sub-section (6) , in case any dividend is paid or claimed for any year during the said period of seven consecutive years, the share shall not be transferred to Investor Education and Protection Fund. In the given case, the final dividend was declared on 30th September 2017. Since Mr. Arjun did not encash the dividend warrant, the dividend remained unpaid. The unpaid amount of dividend should have been transferred to Unpaid Dividend Account within a period of 7 days from expiry of 30 days from the date of declaration of dividends, which should be within 7 days from 30th October 2017. However, the company transferred the unpaid amount to the Unpaid Dividend Account on 10th November 2017. Hence, the company has delayed in transferring the amount and has to pay interest 12% per annum for the delayed period. So, we can say that the company has (presumably) complied with the provisions of the Act by paying the required amount of interest for the delayed period. Further, since the dividends relating to Mr. Arjun from 2017-2018 to 2023-2024 remained continuously unclaimed, the company was legally justified in transferring both the unpaid dividend amounts and the corresponding shares to the IEPF. Hence, Mr. Arjun's contention that the company cannot transfer his shares to IEPF is not valid. In the instant case, Apex Infra Limited transferred the unpaid dividend amounts and corresponding shares of Mr. Arjun to the IEPF who has not claimed the dividend amount pending from 25th October 2017 till 2023-24 i.e. consecutive seven years. Hence, the action taken by the company is valid. Remedy available to Mr. Arjun: Refund of Unclaimed dividend Amount- As per the proviso to Section 125 (3) , any person whose unclaimed dividend was transferred to IEPF, after the expiry of 7 years as per provisions of the Companies Act, 1956, shall be entitled to get refund out of the fund in respect of such claims in accordance with rules made under this section. As per the provision of section 125 (4) , any person claiming to be entitled to the unpaid dividend may apply to the Authority constituted under section 125 (5) for the payment of the money claimed. As per the explanation to sub-section (6) , any claimant of shares transferred to IEPF shall be entitled to reclaim the transferred shares from Investor Education and Protection Fund in accordance with the prescribed procedure and on submission of prescribed documents. Thus, Mr. Arjun can claim both the unpaid dividend and the shares transferred to IEPF by making an application to the IEPF Authority in the prescribed form along with the required documents and verification. Upon verification of the claim, the unpaid dividend amount and the shares shall be refunded/ transferred back to him in accordance with the prescribed procedure.