For a One Person Company, annual filing is almost identical to a private company's — with one big difference and two earlier deadlines. There is no AGM to hold (Section 96(1) of the Companies Act, 2013 exempts you), so your OPC annual filing runs on fixed dates counted straight from the end of the financial year: AOC-4 by September 27 and MGT-7A by November 28 for FY 2025-26. Miss either, and the penalty is Rs.100 a day — exactly the same as everyone else.

OPC annual filing: what you skip and what you still owe

Let's start with the skip. A private company with two members must convene an Annual General Meeting every year, within six months of the financial year-end. An OPC doesn't. Holding an AGM when you are the sole member would be like throwing yourself a birthday party and chairing the toast — the law recognises the absurdity, and Section 96(1) simply exempts OPCs from the requirement.

But don't read “no AGM” as “no compliance.” You still need audited financial statements. You still need an auditor. You still need board meetings — one in each half of the year, with at least 90 days between them under Section 173. And you still file two ROC forms every year. The machine keeps running; it just skips the ceremony.

The two deadlines that matter

Because there is no AGM, there is no “30 days after the AGM” calculation for an OPC. The dates are fixed. For FY 2025-26 (ending 31 March 2026):

MGT-7A (annual return): November 28, 2026. Sixty days from the close of the financial year. This is the earlier one, and the one OPC founders miss most often, because regular private companies effectively get till late November for their annual return (60 days after their September AGM). You don't get that cushion. Sixty days. That's it.

AOC-4 (financial statements): September 27, 2026. Within 180 days of the financial year-end, under Section 137. Regular companies also land in this window — their AOC-4 is due within 30 days of the AGM, and AGMs cluster in late September — but yours is computed directly from March 31, no AGM involved.

AOC-4 vs MGT-7A: which form does what

The two forms answer two different questions. AOC-4 files your financial statements — the balance sheet, profit and loss account, cash flow statement (where applicable), the auditor's report, and the board's report. It tells the Registrar: here is what the company earned, spent, and owns.

MGT-7A is the abridged annual return prescribed for OPCs and small companies. It captures the company's structure, not its money: registered office, principal business activity, the sole member's details, directors, indebtedness, and shareholding. Think of AOC-4 as the medical report and MGT-7A as the ID card.

Both are filed with the Registrar of Companies and signed digitally by a director and, where applicable, a practising professional. Get the details of the AOC-4 filing and the MGT-7 filing right, and the rest is process.

Don't forget ADT-1: the auditor appointment

Here's the filing that surprises first-time OPC owners. You still need a statutory auditor, and every appointment must be reported to the ROC in Form ADT-1 within 15 days of the appointment. The first auditor of an OPC is appointed by the sole member (who is also the board, effectively) within 30 days of incorporation; subsequent auditors are appointed for a five-year term. The ADT-1 filing is quick, but it is frequently overlooked because founders assume the auditor's engagement letter is enough. It isn't. File the form.

The Rs.100-a-day penalty

Late filing of AOC-4 or MGT-7A attracts an additional fee of Rs.100 per day of default under Section 403. There is no separate, gentler slab for OPCs. The meter runs the same.

Twenty days late? Rs.2,000. Three months late? About Rs.9,000 — per form. It compounds quietly, and the MCA does not send reminders. I've seen founders discover a five-figure penalty on a company that had barely any transactions that year. File on time. It's the cheapest compliance you'll ever buy.

When your OPC must stop being an OPC

This is the tripwire most OPC founders never read. An OPC must convert itself into a private or public company if its paid-up share capital crosses Rs.50 lakh or its average annual turnover crosses Rs.2 crore in two consecutive financial years. Conversion then has to happen within six months, and it involves altering your memorandum and articles and filing the conversion forms.

Two consecutive years. Not one good year. The rule is designed so a single spike doesn't force a restructuring, but sustained growth does. If you're scaling, track this in year one — don't wait for year two to remind you.

OPC annual filing is not harder than a regular company's. It's just less forgiving on dates, and it punishes the “I'll do it after the AGM” mindset — because there is no AGM. Mark November 28 and September 27, keep your auditor appointment current, and the year ends quietly. If you'd rather hand the whole thing over, our ROC annual filing service handles AOC-4, MGT-7A, and the auditor paperwork end to end.