Section 14 — Penalties

¹[(1)] If any person—

(a) in any return to be furnished under this Act makes any statement which is false and which he knows to be false or does not believe to be true, or

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(c) having the control or custody of any account book or other record, fails to produce such book or record when required so to do under this Act,

he shall be ³[warned at the first instance, and in case of continuing or repeated contraventions, he shall be liable to penalty of not less than twenty-five thousand rupees but may extend to one lakh rupees].

⁴[(2) If the person committing any offence specified in sub-section (1) is a company, every person who, at the time the offence was committed was in charge of, and was responsible to, the company for the conduct of the business of the company as well as the company shall be deemed to be guilty of the offence and shall be liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly:

Provided that nothing contained in this sub-section shall render any such person liable to any punishment provided in this Act, if he proves that the offence was committed without his knowledge or that he exercised all due diligence to prevent the commission of such offence.

(3) Notwithstanding anything contained in sub-section (2), where an offence under sub-section (1) has been committed by a company and it is proved that the offence has been committed with the consent or connivance of, or is attributable to any neglect on the part of, any director, manager, secretary or other officer of the company, such director, manager, secretary or other officer shall also be deemed to be guilty of that offence and shall be liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly.

Explanation.--- For the purposes of this section,---

(a) “company” means any body corporate and includes a firm or other association of individuals; and

(b) “director” in relation to a firm means a partner in the firm.]