Security Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has announced relaxation to the listed entities to file the fourth quarterly report Q4 and annual financial results relating to FY 2019-20 by June 30, 2020.

The Corporates will now be required to file their quarterly financial results for the financial year 2019-20 up to June 30, 2020 given 45 days relaxations. As per the time frame, the deadline earlier was May 15, 2020.

In the case of submitting annual results for the year ending March 31, the SEBI has extended the time till June 30. Normally, listed companies are required to file their annual results within 60 days from the end of a financial year.

In addition to this, one month relaxation has also been given for filing quarterly corporate governance report, half-yearly compliance certificate on share transfer and yearly secretarial compliance report and three week each for filing the shareholding pattern and statement of investor complaint reports.

Even relaxation in the time-gap required between two board meetings of a company has been provided. SEBI has stated that the board of directors and the audit committee of the listed entity are exempted from observing the stipulated time gap between two meetings for the meeting held or proposed to be held between the period December 1, 2019 and June 30, 2020. However, they are required to meet at least four times a year as stipulated under listing agreement.

SEBI has stated in its circular that ‘Development arising due to the spread of the virus warrants the need for temporary relaxation in compliance requirement of listed entities’.

The above relaxations have been provided in view of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has resulted into many restrictions including lockdown, hampering the movement of the people, business day-to-day operations, supply chain etc.