The Indian Partnership Act, 1932

§69 — Effect of non-registration

(1) No suit to enforce a right arising from a contract or conferred by this Act shall be institutes in any Court by or on behalf of any person suing as a partner in a firm against the firm or any person alleged to be or to have been a partner in the firm unless the firm is registered and the person suing is or has been shown in the Register of Firms as a partner in the firm. (2) No suit to enforce a tight arising from a contract shall be instituted in any Court by or on behalf of a firm against any third party unless the firm is registered and the persons suing are or have been shown in the Register of Firms as partners in the firm. (3) The provisions of sub-sections (1) and (2) shall apply also to a claim of set-off or other proceeding to enforce a right arising from a contract, but shall not affect— (a) the enforcement of any right to sue for the dissolution of a firm or for accounts of a dissolved firm, or a ay right or power to realise the property of a dissolved firm, or (b) the powers of an official assignee, receiver or Court under the Presidency-towns Insolvency Act, 1909 (2 of 1909), or the Provincial Insolvency Act, 1920 (5 of 1920), to realise the property of an insolvent partner. (4) This section shall not apply— (a) to firms or to partners in firms which have no place of business in [the territories to which this Act extends], or whose places of business in [the said territories] are situated in areas to which, by notification under [section 56], this Chapter does not apply, or (b) to any suit or claim of set-off not exceeding one hundred rupees in value which, in the Presidency-towns, is not of a kind specified in section 19 of the Presidency Small Cause Courts Act, 1882 (15 of 1882), or, outside the Presidency-towns, is not of a kind specified in the Second Schedule to the Provincial Small Cause Courts Act, 1887 (9 of 1887), or to any proceeding in execution or other proceeding incidental to or arising from any such suit or claim.

State amendments

This section has been amended in its application to Maharashtra. The text above is the central provision and is what applies everywhere else — these amendments are law only in the State that made them.

Maharashtra[Vide Maharashtra Act 16 of 2018, s. 3]Read →Hide
Maharashtra Substitution of section 69A of IX of 1932.--For section 69A of the principal Act, the following section shall be substituted, namely:-- "69A. Charges for delay in compliance of section 60, 61, 62 or 63.--If any statement, intimation or notice under section 60, 61, 62 or as the case may be, 63, in respect of any registered firm is not sent or given to the Registrar, within the period specified in that section, the Registrar may, make suitable amendments in the records relating to the firm, upon payment of charges for delay in sending or giving Schedule, for “Part A States and Part C States”. “such States”. First Schedule, for “section 55”. the same, at the rate of rupees two thousand per year or part thereof in respect of the period between the date of expiry of the period specified in that section and the date of making the payment.”.
Maharashtra[Vide Maharashtra Act 29 of 1984, s. 13]Read →Hide
Amendment of section 69 of Act IX of 1932.—In section 69 of the principal Act,— (a) to sub-section (1), the following proviso shall be added, namely :— “Provided that the requirement of registration of firm under this sub-section shall not apply to the suits or proceedings instituted by the heirs or legal representatives of the deceased partner of a firm for accounts of the firm or to realise the property of the firm.”; (b) after sub-section (2), the following sub-section shall be inserted, namely :— “(2A) No suit to enforce any right for the dissolution of a firm or for accounts of a dissolved firm or any right or power to realise the property of a dissolved firm shall be instituted in any Court by or on behalf of any person suing as a partner in a firm against the firm or any person alleged to be or to have been a partner in the firm, unless the firm is registered and the person suing is or has been shown in the Register of Firm as a partner in the firm : Provided that the requirement of registration of firm under this sub-section shall not apply to the suits or proceedings instituted by the heirs or legal representatives of the deceased partner of a firm for accounts of a dissolved firm or to realise the property of a dissolved firm.”; (c) in sub-section (3),— (i) for the words, brackets and figures “sub-sections (1) and (2)” to words, brackets, figures and letter “sub-sections (1), (2) and (2A)” shall be substituted ; (ii) for clause (a), the following clause shall be substituted, namely :— “(a) the firms constituted for a duration upto six months or with a capital upto two thousand rupees ; or”

Reproduced from the same official PDF as the section above, as the amending Act words it — not a consolidated State version of the section. Check the source before relying on it.

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Source & version

Official text: India Code (official) ↗

Official India Code text: The Indian Partnership Act, 1932, English PDF (bitstream 123456789/2394/1/aA1932-9.pdf, 425,539 bytes, sha256 6fa1e7859290a72c...) fetched directly from indiacode.nic.in (Akamai edge, DNS via dns.google) on 2026-08-03. Extracted via pdftotext 26.07 -bbox and the @nexlex/ingest inline parser. Automated parse; footnotes and amendment history excluded. Spot-verified against the PDF; full clause-level proofread pending.

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