Jupiter Ltd. appointed Ashok as an Independent director for a term of three years. Upon completion of his first term, he was re-appointed for another term for the same period. Now upon completion of the second term, comp

Section 149(10) of the Companies Act, 2013 prescribes that subject to the provisions of section 152, an independent director shall hold office for a term up to five consecutive years on the Board of a company, but shall be eligible for reappointment on passing of a special resolution by the company and disclosure of such appointment in the Board's report. Section 149(11) states that no independent director shall hold office for more than two consecutive terms, but such independent director shall be eligible for appointment after the expiration of three years of ceasing to become an independent director provided that an independent director shall not, during the said period of three years, be appointed in or be associated with the company in any other capacity, either directly or indirectly. General Circular No. 14/2014 issued by MCA dated 9th June, 2014 clarifies that though an independent director is to be appointed for a term up to 5 years, there is no bar on appointment for a term of less than 5 years. However, such appointment for less than 5 years is to be counted as one term and at the end of two such consecutive terms, the director should demit his office, even if the total number of years of his appointment in such two consecutive terms is less than 10 years. In such a case, at the end of the 2 consecutive terms, he cannot be reappointed again as independent director and the cooling period of 3 years shall start. In view of the above, Jupiter Ltd. cannot reappoint Ashok as independent director of the company at the end of second consecutive term.