Annual Compliance for Private Limited Company: September 2026 Deadlines You Cannot Miss

September is the single heaviest month in the annual compliance for private limited company calendar. For financial year 2025-26, four separate obligations land inside the same thirty days, and three of them share one date: 30 September 2026. Boards that treat September as a filing month rather than a meeting month usually discover too late that the paperwork had to start in the last week of August. If you are still mapping the full year, our annual compliance service for private limited companies sets out the complete cycle.

This guide lists every September 2026 due date that applies to a company registered under the Companies Act, 2013, what changed this year (the DIR-3 KYC position is not what most articles still say), and what has to be signed before each meeting can be held. Where a board meeting or general meeting is involved, the notices, minutes and resolutions carry as much weight as the form filed afterwards.

September 2026 compliance calendar at a glance

Due date	Compliance	Form / provision	Who it applies to
8 September 2026	Dispatch AGM notice (21 clear days)	Section 101, Companies Act 2013	Every company holding its AGM on 30 September
15 September 2026	Second advance tax instalment (45% cumulative)	Section 211, Income-tax Act 1961	Companies with tax liability above Rs. 10,000
30 September 2026	Annual General Meeting for FY 2025-26	Section 96	Every company other than a One Person Company
30 September 2026	Adoption of audited financial statements and Board’s Report	Sections 129 and 134	All companies
30 September 2026	Tax audit report in Form 3CA and Form 3CD	Section 44AB	Companies crossing the audit threshold
Verify your cycle	DIR-3 KYC Web (now triennial)	Rule 12A	Every DIN holder

A month-by-month view of the rest of the year sits in our ROC compliance calendar for 2025-2026.

Does every private limited company have to hold its AGM by 30 September 2026?

Yes, with two exceptions. Section 96 requires the AGM to be held within six months of the close of the financial year, and not more than fifteen months after the previous AGM. For a financial year ended 31 March 2026, that fixes the outer date at 30 September 2026.

• First AGM: a newly incorporated company gets nine months from the close of its first financial year, so a company whose first year ended 31 March 2026 has until 31 December 2026. This relaxation applies only once. Companies that completed private limited company registration during FY 2025-26 fall in this bucket.
• One Person Company: Section 96 does not apply at all, so no AGM is required. An OPC still has to file its financial statements and annual return.
• Extension: the Registrar may extend the AGM date by up to three months on an application in Form GNL-1, filed before the due date. An extension is never available for the first AGM.

In practice, the annual compliance for private limited company timeline for FY 2025-26 starts with the notice, not the meeting. Twenty-one clear days means the day of dispatch and the day of the meeting are both excluded, so a 30 September AGM needs its notice issued by 8 September 2026. A shorter notice is possible only with the consent of members holding at least 95 per cent of the voting power, recorded in writing or electronically.

What must be signed before the AGM notice goes out

• Audited financial statements for FY 2025-26, signed by two directors and the auditor
• The independent auditor’s report
• Board’s Report with its annexures, including AOC-2 where related party transactions were entered into
• Notice of the AGM with the explanatory statement under Section 102
• Directors’ disclosures in Form MBP-1 and Form DIR-8 for the year
• Board resolution approving the accounts and calling the meeting, minuted in line with Secretarial Standard 1

Companies that cross the thresholds in Section 204 also need to place a secretarial audit report before the same meeting. Our secretarial audit service covers that assessment.

DIR-3 KYC in September 2026: the rule has changed

This is the deadline most compliance checklists are still getting wrong. The Companies (Appointment and Qualification of Directors) Amendment Rules, 2025, notified through G.S.R. 943(E) and effective from 31 March 2026, moved director KYC from an annual filing to a triennial one. Under the amended Rule 12A:

• DIR-3 KYC Web is filed once every three consecutive financial years, not every September
• The due date shifts to 30 June of the year immediately following the third financial year
• The earlier e-form and web service are consolidated into a single Form DIR-3 KYC Web
• Any change in mobile number, email address or residential address must still be reported within 30 days, and such an update does not reset the three-year cycle

The practical instruction for September 2026 is therefore: do not assume a filing is due, and do not assume one is not. Check the DIN status and the last KYC filed on the MCA portal before the month ends. A DIN that is deactivated for non-filing costs Rs. 5,000 to restore, and until it is restored the director cannot sign a single MCA form, which stalls the AGM filings that follow in October and November.

Tax audit report: 30 September 2026

Where Section 44AB applies, the audit report for assessment year 2026-27 must be furnished by 30 September 2026, one month before the return due date. A company whose accounts are already audited under the Companies Act reports in Form 3CA together with Form 3CD; Form 3CB is used only where no other law requires an audit.

• Turnover threshold for business: Rs. 1 crore, rising to Rs. 10 crore where cash receipts and cash payments each stay within 5 per cent of the total
• Return of income for audited cases (ITR-6): 31 October 2026
• Transfer pricing cases: Form 3CEB by 31 October 2026 and the return by 30 November 2026
• Belated return for AY 2026-27: 31 December 2026

The CBDT has extended the audit report date in some earlier years, but an extension is a concession and not a plan. Confirm the position on the income tax e-filing portal rather than on a news headline.

Advance tax: 15 September 2026

Every company with an estimated tax liability above Rs. 10,000 must have paid 45 per cent of its full-year advance tax by 15 September 2026, counting the 15 per cent already due in June. Falling short triggers interest under Section 234C for the quarter and, if the shortfall persists to the year end, under Section 234B as well. Because the estimate depends on FY 2025-26 results being reasonably firm, most boards run this calculation in the same week as the audit sign-off.

What falls due immediately after September

The annual compliance for private limited company calendar does not close on 30 September. Three ROC filings are triggered by the AGM itself, and their clocks start on the date the meeting is actually held.

Filing	Trigger	Date if AGM is held 30 September 2026
Form ADT-1 (auditor appointment)	Within 15 days of the AGM	15 October 2026
Form AOC-4 or AOC-4 XBRL (financial statements)	Within 30 days of the AGM	30 October 2026
Form MGT-7 or MGT-7A (annual return)	Within 60 days of the AGM	29 November 2026
ITR-6 (audited cases)	Statutory date	31 October 2026

Small companies and OPCs file the abridged annual return in Form MGT-7A instead of MGT-7. Groups that also run a limited liability partnership should note that LLP annual compliance follows a separate cycle, with Form 8 due on 30 October. A Nidhi company carries additional returns on top of the standard set, covered under annual compliance for Nidhi companies.

What it costs to miss a September deadline

• Late AOC-4 or MGT-7: Rs. 100 per day per form, with no upper ceiling, running until the form is actually filed
• AGM not held: penalty under Section 99 of up to Rs. 1,00,000 on the company and every officer in default, plus Rs. 5,000 for each day the default continues
• DIN deactivation: Rs. 5,000 to reactivate, and no MCA form can be signed in the meantime
• Late income tax return: fee under Section 234F of up to Rs. 5,000, along with interest under Sections 234A, 234B and 234C
• Three consecutive years of default: directors are disqualified under Section 164(2), which blocks appointment in any company for five years

Companies already carrying a backlog of unfiled years should deal with the arrears before adding FY 2025-26 to the pile; our ROC compliance recovery work is built exactly for that situation.

A four-week plan for September 2026

1. Week 1 (1 to 8 September): hold the board meeting, approve the audited accounts and Board’s Report, and dispatch the AGM notice by 8 September.
2. Week 2 (9 to 15 September): compute and pay the second advance tax installment; collect MBP-1 and DIR-8 disclosures.
3. Week 3 (16 to 23 September): complete the tax audit working papers and verify every DIN’s KYC status on the MCA portal.
4. Week 4 (24 to 30 September): hold the AGM, upload the tax audit report, and record the minutes within thirty days of the meeting.

Frequently asked questions

What is the last date for the AGM of a private limited company for FY 2025-26?

30 September 2026. Section 96 allows six months from the close of the financial year, and for a year ended 31 March 2026 that expires on 30 September 2026. A company holding its first AGM has until 31 December 2026.

Can the 30 September 2026 AGM date be extended?

Yes, by up to three months, if the Registrar grants an extension on an application in Form GNL-1 supported by a valid reason. The application must be filed before 30 September 2026, and no extension is available for a first AGM.

Is DIR-3 KYC due on 30 September 2026?

Not for every director. The amended Rule 12A, effective 31 March 2026, made DIR-3 KYC a once-in-three-years filing due on 30 June of the relevant year. Directors should confirm their own cycle and DIN status on the MCA portal, and must still report any change of mobile number, email or address within 30 days.

Does a One Person Company have to hold an AGM in September?

No. Section 96 does not apply to an OPC. It must still file Form AOC-4 within 180 days of the close of the financial year and Form MGT-7A as its annual return.

What are the AOC-4 and MGT-7 due dates for FY 2025-26?

Both run from the AGM date, not from 30 September. If the AGM is held on 30 September 2026, AOC-4 is due by 30 October 2026 and MGT-7 or MGT-7A by 29 November 2026. Holding the AGM earlier pulls both dates forward.

Does a company with no business activity still have to file?

Yes. A dormant or nil-revenue company files the same AOC-4 and MGT-7A, and the Rs. 100 per day late fee applies identically. If the company is genuinely not going to trade again, closing it through a formal strike off is cheaper than carrying the filings year after year.

What is the penalty for filing AOC-4 late?

Rs. 100 per day of delay, with no maximum limit. Separate penalties under Section 137 apply to the company and to the officers in default, which is why a delay of a few months can cost more than the professional fee for the whole year.

Getting September 2026 closed on time

Nothing on this list is difficult on its own. What creates the risk is the compression: the notice, the audit, the advance tax computation and the meeting itself all have to be sequenced inside four weeks, and each one depends on the accounts being finalised first. Treated as a single project started in the first week of September, annual compliance for private limited company obligations for FY 2025-26 close cleanly and the October and November ROC filings fall into place behind them. Treated as four unrelated errands, they overlap, and the Rs. 100 per day clock starts before anyone notices.