Retrospective vicarious criminal liability for company excise offences is impermissible without specific allegations of consent, connivance, or neglect.

Section 9AA of the Central Excises and Salt Act, 1944 imposes vicarious criminal liability only on persons who were in charge of and responsible for a company's business at the time of the offence, or on directors or officers where consent, connivance, or neglect is specifically alleged. The complaint here lacked such allegations and the former director had ceased office before the provision came into force. Applying Section 9AA to a 1979 offence would create impermissible retrospective criminal liability, so the criminal process was unsustainable and was quashed as an abuse of process.

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Issues: Whether the criminal process issued against a former director of a company for an excise offence allegedly committed in 1979 could be sustained on the basis of Section 9AA of the Central Excises and Salt Act, 1944, and whether the complaint contained the necessary allegations to attract director liability.

Analysis: Section 9AA, introduced in 1985, creates liability for persons in charge of and responsible for the conduct of the business of a company at the time of the offence, and also for directors or officers where the offence is committed with their consent, connivance, or neglect. The complaint did not allege that the petitioner was in charge of the company's business in the relevant sense, nor did it contain any specific allegation of consent, connivance, or neglect. The petitioner had also ceased to be a director in 1981, before the provision was brought into force. In these circumstances, applying Section 9AA to fasten liability for a 1979 offence would amount to retrospective criminal liability, which is impermissible.

Conclusion: The process issued against the petitioner was unsustainable and was quashed as an abuse of process of court.

Ratio Decidendi: A statutory provision imposing vicarious criminal liability for company offences cannot be applied retrospectively to fasten criminal responsibility for an offence committed before its enactment, and such liability cannot arise in the absence of specific allegations bringing the case within the provision.

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