skills/operational-creditor-application-drafter/SKILL.md

---
name: operational-creditor-application-drafter
description: Tests and drafts an Indian operational creditor demand and section 9 IBC application. Use for unpaid goods, services, employment or statutory operational debt where default, threshold, limitation, service and absence of a pre-existing dispute must be established.
---

# Operational Creditor Application Drafter

Use CIRP for a qualifying insolvency default, not as a substitute for ordinary debt collection. Treat a genuine pre-existing dispute as a threshold issue before preparing a demand.

## Required inputs

- Operational creditor and corporate debtor legal details and authority
- Contract, purchase order, invoices and delivery or service evidence
- Ledger, bank, GST, TDS, information utility and acknowledgment records
- Default amount and date, payments, credits, interest and limitation history
- Complaints, correspondence, quality issues, set-off and prior proceedings
- Registered office, electronic addresses and service evidence
- MSME, arbitration, civil, tax or other dispute status
- Proposed IRP details if current law or strategy requires them

## Method

1. **Verify current eligibility.** Check the IBC, 2026 amendments, notified threshold, commencement and savings, section 10A exclusion, operational-debt status and NCLT jurisdiction as of filing.
2. **Calculate debt and default.** Reconcile invoices, contractual performance, credits, taxes, interest and payments. Identify the precise default date and amount above the current threshold.
3. **Check limitation.** Build a dated schedule of accrual, acknowledgments, part payments, proceedings and any claimed exclusion. Do not rely on an invoice date alone.
4. **Test pre-existing dispute.** Review all material before the demand, including arbitration or suits and plausible factual disputes. Distinguish a genuine dispute from a later unsupported denial.
5. **Prepare section 8 demand.** Use the current prescribed form and authorised signatory, attach accurate particulars, choose the lawful service modes and preserve proof of delivery.
6. **Track the response period.** Record payment, dispute notice, settlement, returned service and expiry under the current statute. Reassess eligibility after any response.
7. **Prepare section 9 application.** Use current NCLT rules and form; plead corporate debtor details, operational debt, default, demand service, non-payment and dispute status with exact record citations.
8. **Assemble evidence.** Prepare affidavits, bank or information-utility material, invoices, contract, proof of performance, computation, authority, service and fee documents required on the filing date.
9. **Audit completeness.** Verify signatures, dates, pagination, legibility, translations, electronic filing, service and consistency across demand, application and annexures.

## Output

Produce an eligibility and dispute memo, debt and limitation schedule, section 8 demand pack, service tracker, section 9 application, affidavit and annexure index, defect checklist and hearing issue note.

## Guardrails

- Do not suppress a pre-existing dispute, fabricate service or acknowledgment, split invoices artificially or inflate the threshold amount.
- Do not threaten CIRP solely to coerce payment of a genuinely contested debt.
- Do not file against the wrong entity, branch or non-corporate person.
- Preserve settlement privilege and confidential commercial and personal data.
- Require current Indian insolvency counsel to verify eligibility, form, forum, service and filing.