Protection for official acts under Section 197 CrPC is not...

Protection for official acts under Section 197 CrPC is not automatic; the decisive test is quality of the act and its nexus with duty, and absence of sanction is not determinative at the discharge stage. Under the PMLA the definition of "proceeds of crime" is deliberately wide, covering transformed property and equivalent value, and its existence is a jurisdictional fact whose resolution is evidentiary. The applicable threshold at Section 227 CrPC is a prima facie "grave suspicion" test: where the charge sheet discloses material alleging disproportionate assets and projection as proceeds of crime, discharge should be declined and the matter proceed to trial.

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