AOC-4 and MGT-7: meaning, how they work in India and examples

Every company registered in India must file its accounts and an annual return with the RoC, which works under the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA). AOC-4 is the form for the accounts. MGT-7 is the form for the annual return. Both are filed online on the MCA portal, and once filed they become public documents.

This matters for startups because a private company does not publish results the way a listed company does. These two forms are often the only official place where its revenue, loss, net worth and shareholder list can be checked. Many news stories about a startup's yearly revenue or loss trace back to an AOC-4 filing that a data firm or reporter has read.

AOC-4 is the cover form for the financial statements that the board approved and the shareholders adopted at the AGM. The statements themselves are attached to the form. A company that prepares consolidated accounts for its group files a separate consolidated version of the form.

The attachments are where the useful numbers sit. A reader opening an AOC-4 will usually find the following.

• Balance sheet: what the company owns and owes at the year-end, including share capital, reserves, borrowings and cash.
• Statement of profit and loss: revenue, expenses, exceptional items, tax and the final profit or loss.
• Cash flow statement, where the company is required to prepare one.
• Notes to the accounts, including related-party dealings, contingent liabilities and the accounting policies.
• Auditor's report, which states whether the accounts give a true and fair view and flags any qualification.
• Board's report, which describes the year's business, dividends, the directors and any frauds reported by the auditor.

MGT-7 is the annual return. It is a snapshot of who owns and runs the company, rather than how much money it made. The Companies Act requires it from every company, and it is signed by a director and a company secretary or, in some cases, a practising professional.

A startup's MGT-7 typically shows the following.

• Share capital: authorised, issued and paid-up capital, and the classes of shares such as equity shares or compulsorily convertible preference shares (CCPS).
• Shareholding pattern: the promoters, the institutional investors and the foreign holders, with the percentage each holds.
• Directors and key managerial personnel, with appointments and exits during the year.
• Turnover and net worth, for companies where the form asks for them, plus remuneration paid to directors.
• Details of meetings held, and whether any penalties were imposed on the company or its officers.
• Indebtedness: borrowings at year-end, shown in broad heads.

Both deadlines run from the date of the AGM. As of November 2026, the usual reading is that AOC-4 is due within 30 days of the AGM and MGT-7 within 60 days of it. The Companies Act expects an AGM within six months of the financial year-end, so a company with a 31 March year-end normally holds its AGM by 30 September.

Late filing attracts an additional fee for every day of delay, on top of the normal filing fee. Compliance firms put the daily fee at ₹100 per form, but the amount and any cap are set by the MCA and have changed over the years, so the current MCA fee schedule is the only safe source. Delay can also bring penalties on the company and its directors.

• Financial year-end: 31 March for most Indian companies.
• AGM: within 6 months of the year-end, so by 30 September.
• AOC-4: within 30 days of the AGM, so about 30 October.
• MGT-7: within 60 days of the AGM, so about 29 November.
• One person companies and small companies file a shorter annual return form, MGT-7A, instead of MGT-7.

Section 137 of the Companies Act, 2013 requires a company to file a copy of its financial statements, with all documents attached, with the RoC within 30 days of the AGM. The form, the attachments and the fees come from the Companies (Accounts) Rules, 2014 and from the MCA's portal notices.

Section 92 requires every company to prepare an annual return and, under sub-section 4, to file it with the RoC within 60 days of the AGM. Listed companies and larger companies must also put the annual return on their website. A company that misses the dates is in default, and the Act sets penalties for the company and for every officer in default. Rules and fees are revised from time to time, so a professional should confirm the position for the year in question.

Anyone can pull these forms from the MCA portal's public document section by searching for the company name or its Corporate Identification Number (CIN). The portal charges a small fee per document, and the forms download as files with the attached accounts. Data firms read these filings in bulk, which is how startup revenue tables get built.

For a quick read, open the AOC-4 attachments in this order: the auditor's report, the profit and loss statement, the balance sheet and then the notes. Check the financial year at the top, since a filing in late 2025 usually covers the year ended March 2025. Then open the latest MGT-7 for the shareholding and the list of directors.

Check the basis first. Group companies file standalone and consolidated accounts, and the two can differ a lot. A story quoting the standalone revenue of an operating company is not describing the whole group.

A filing is a record of the past. An AOC-4 filed in November 2026 describes the year ended March 2026 at the latest, and later months may look different. Filings also arrive late, so a startup with no new filing may be late rather than quiet.

Look for amounts shown in thousands, lakh or crore, which the statements state at the top. A misread unit is a common cause of a wrong revenue headline. Finally, a small number of startups file revised accounts, so the latest version of a form is the one to use.

The first mistake is reading the wrong year. A filing shows the year of the accounts, not the year of the filing, so a form uploaded in January can describe a year that ended in March of the year before. The second is reading the wrong entity. Startups often run several companies, such as a parent, an operating company and an overseas arm, and each files on its own.

A third mistake is trusting a number from a data summary without opening the attachment. Summaries may merge revenue with other income, or pick standalone figures where the headline needs consolidated ones. A fourth is treating an unfiled form as proof of trouble. Delays are common, and the MCA portal shows the date of each filing, which helps separate a late filer from an inactive one.

AOC-4 and MGT-7 are filed by every company, listed or not. A listed company also publishes quarterly results to the stock exchanges, and a company planning an IPO publishes a draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) with restated accounts. Those documents are richer, but a private startup before an IPO has only these annual forms.

The two forms also answer different questions. Ask AOC-4 how the business performed. Ask MGT-7 who owns it. A single startup story about a cap table change is more likely to cite MGT-7 or a separate allotment form, while a story about revenue is more likely to cite AOC-4. The content here is general information, not legal advice, so check with a company secretary or chartered accountant before relying on a filing for a decision.