The Regional Director of the Employees' State Insurance Corporation, Thrissur, is the appellant herein. The appellant is aggrieved by the judgment of the Employees' Insurance Court, Kozhikode, in I.C.No.57/2006. The respondent filed the I.C. challenging the order of the appellant imposing on the respondent, damages amounting to ` 2,78,669/-, as per Exts.P3, P6, P7 and P9 under Section 85B of the Employees' State Insurance Act for delayed payment of contributions for the period from 8/03 to 6/04, 1993-1995 and from 9/2000 to 7/02, 4/04 to 9/04 and 1996-1997. The respondent challenged the order imposing damages on the ground that insofar as the delay in payment of contributions was purely on account of acute financial difficulties of the respondent, no damages could have been validly imposed on them in view of the various decisions of this Court, particularly the decision in E.S.I.Corporation v. Premanandan , 2007 (2) KLT 666. The E.I.Court accepted the contention of the respondent and held that financial difficulties
