New, improved company laws likely in December: Khurshid

India is set to get a ''brand new company law by end of the current fiscal year'', union minister for corporate and minority affairs Salman Khursheed said in Kolkata on yesterday. It would be a state-of-the-art law, he said, adding that it might have a simple code on the liability of independent directors.

The Bhopal gas tragedy of 1984 and its sequel are likely to have a bearing on the companies bill, 2009, which was being scrutinised till Tuesday by Parliament's standing committee on finance. The government would incorporate in the Bill the Supreme Court's expressed views on the liability of company directors for criminal acts, said Salman Khurshid.

Addressing the Bengal National Chamber of Commerce and Industry, he said the suggestions made by the standing committee would need to be vetted by the union law ministry, after which it would be brought back to Parliament for passage. ''We are targeting the winter session, and if we somehow miss it, since it is very short, we will place it during the budget session (next year),'' he said.

The minister was in Kolkata on the occasion of the 38th national convention of company secretaries, organised by the Indian Institute of Company Secretaries (ICSI), which he addressed on similar lines.

"The curative petition filed by the CBI (Central Bureau of Investigation) on the Bhopal case is before the Supreme Court ... whatever comes from it has to be factored into the bill, as on criminal liability of directors we need to have guidance,'' Khurshid told the convention.

To a question on the changes suggested by the parliamentary panel, he said the panel had asked the ministry for some specifics. Citing an instance, he said the new bill might have a comprehensive but simple code for independent directors. ''We do not want people to get lost in provisos - it would be an exposition on the obligations and responsibilities of an independent director and the kind of caveats that go with it,'' he added.