Special statute remedies prevail over inherent jurisdiction, and court-caused delay may be excluded from statutory attachment timelines.

A petition under Section 482 CrPC was treated as an improper route to challenge PMLA proceedings because the special statute provided a complete appellate hierarchy, including appeal to the Appellate Tribunal and further appeal to the High Court; the challenge had to proceed through those remedies. The 150-day objection to provisional attachment under Section 5 was also rejected, as delay caused by court proceedings and an undertaking before the court was excluded from the statutory period on the principle that an act of the court should prejudice no one. The attachment challenge therefore failed, with liberty preserved to pursue the statutory remedies.

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Issues: (i) Whether a petition under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 was maintainable to quash proceedings under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 in the presence of an express appellate mechanism under the statute. (ii) Whether the expiry of the 150-day period for provisional attachment under Section 5 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 rendered the complaint before the Adjudicating Authority incapable of adjudication.

Issue (i): Whether a petition under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 was maintainable to quash proceedings under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 in the presence of an express appellate mechanism under the statute.

Analysis: The statutory scheme provided a complete hierarchy of remedies. Proceedings under the Act were quasi-judicial in nature, the order of the Adjudicating Authority was appealable to the Appellate Tribunal under Section 26, and a further appeal lay to the High Court under Section 42. Since the petitioner could pursue the remedies under the special statute, invocation of inherent jurisdiction to quash the proceedings was not justified.

Conclusion: The petition was not maintainable for bypassing the statutory appellate remedies, and this issue was decided against the petitioner.

Issue (ii): Whether the expiry of the 150-day period for provisional attachment under Section 5 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 rendered the complaint before the Adjudicating Authority incapable of adjudication.

Analysis: The period of provisional attachment under Section 5(3) was held to be capable of exclusion where the delay in adjudication resulted from proceedings before the Court and an undertaking given before the Court. Applying the principle that an act of the Court should prejudice no one, the intervening period during which the matter remained stalled because of the Court proceedings was excluded from the reckoning of the statutory period. On that basis, the complaint before the Adjudicating Authority was not treated as time-barred.

Conclusion: The 150-day objection was rejected, and this issue was decided against the petitioner.

Final Conclusion: The statutory remedies under the special enactment were held to be the proper course, and the challenge to the attachment proceedings failed, while liberty was left to pursue the remedy before the Adjudicating Authority and thereafter in appeal if required.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a special statute provides a complete appellate mechanism, inherent criminal jurisdiction should not ordinarily be used to bypass it, and delay caused by court-directed restraint may be excluded from the computation of a statutory period so that no party is prejudiced by the Court's intervention.

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