TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2025 (6) TMI 110
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....short 'GST Act'). 3. Adumbrated facts as emanating from the record and relevant for the purpose of disposal of these petitions are that on receipt of an information in the office of the respondent-Directorate General, Goods & Service Tax Intelligence to the effect that a fictitious firm was formed under the name of M/s Dashmesh Traders, which was having GST No. 02BWAPS5236F1ZT, and this firm was engaged in availing and passing on fraudulent Input Tax Credit (for short 'ITC'), investigation was initiated by the respondent in order to ascertain the genuineness of the firm and its business. It was revealed that the firm was registered at a fictitious address by misusing false and fabricated documents. It was further revealed that one of the major beneficiaries in the transactions conducted through the firm was one M/s NK Gupta Builders Pvt. Ltd. Sahil Gupta, Director of the above company, was contacted and he recorded his statement that one Sandeep Garg was acting as a middleman for generating good less invoices and procuring them from M/s Dashmesh Traders. Aforesaid Sandeep Garg was proprietor of a firm named M/s Pashupati Enterprises, who, on being questioned, recorded a statemen....
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.... be tendered by the respondent is documentary and electronic in nature and there can be no apprehension of their tampering with evidence or intimidating or influencing the witnesses. They have been arrested only on the basis of suspicion. They do not have any criminal antecedents and have permanent places of businesses. There is no flight risk as they are ready to surrender their passport and to abide by other terms and conditions of bail to be imposed upon them. The respondent has not been able to show reasons to believe their involvement in commission of subject offence. It is, therefore, stressed that the petitions deserve to be allowed and the petitioners deserve to be released on bail. In support of his arguments, learned counsel for the petitioners has relied upon Ratnambar Kaushik vs. Union of India, 2022 INSC 1254, Ashutosh Garg vs. Union of India, 2024 (105) GST 572, Vipin Garg alias Bindu vs. State of Haryana, 2023(69) GSTL 3, Yash Goyal vs. Union of India, Criminal Appeal No. 2784 of 2024, decided on 28.06.2024, Deepak Sharma vs. State of Punjab, 2024 NCPHHC 104729, Parteek Das Gupta vs. State of Haryana, 2024 NCPHHC 46670, Amit Bansal vs. State of Haryana, 2024 NCPHHC 1....
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.... vs. Union of India Ors, 2019 (25) GSTL 185, K.I. Pavunny vs. Assistant Collector, Central Excise Collectorate, Chochin, 1997 (3) RCR CRL. 71, Sundeep Mahendra Kumar Sanghvi vs. Union Of India, SCA NO 8669 OF 2020, State of Gujarat vs. Mohanlal Jitamalji Porwal, (SC), 1987 (2) SCC 364, Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy vs. Central Bureau of Investigation (SC), 2013 (3) RCR CRL. 108, Adri Dharan Das vs. State of West Bengal, (SC), 2005 (2) RCR CRL. 32, Union of India vs. Sapna Jain & Ors., SLP- (CRL)-4322/24/2019, Suresh Kumar P.P. vs. Deputy Director, Directorate General of GST Intelligence (DGGI), (Kerala) (DB), 2020 (41) GSTL 17, Suresh Kumar P.P. vs. Deputy Director, Directorate General of GST Intelligence (DGGI), SLP-(C)-13128-2020, Rakesh Arora vs. State of Punjab, CRM-M-1511-2022, decided on 28/01/2021 and Ashish Jain vs. Union of India (Bombay DB), 2019 (29) GSTL 6. 8. The rival submissions made by both the parties have been heard and carefully considered, besides going through the material placed on record. 9. Before proceeding to decide the prayer made by the petitioners for grant of bail, it would be apt to have a look at the relevant statutory provision contained in Section 1....
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....und guilty. However, there are instances in our criminal law where a reverse onus has been placed on an accused with regard to some specific offences but that is another matter and does not detract from the fundamental postulate in respect of other offences. Yet another important facet of our criminal jurisprudence is that the grant of bail is the general rule and putting a person in jail or in a prison or in a correction home (whichever expression one may wish to use) is an exception. Unfortunately, some of these basic principles appear to have been lost sight of with the result that more and more persons are being incarcerated and for longer periods. This does not do any good to our criminal jurisprudence or to our society. 5. The historical background of the provision for bail has been elaborately and lucidly explained in a recent decision delivered in Nikesh Tarachand Shah v. Union of India [(2018) 11 SCC 1] going back to the days of the Magna Carta. In that decision, reference was made to Gurbaksh Singh Sibbia v. State of Punjab [(1980) 2 SCC 565] in which it is observed that it was held way back in Nagendra v. King-Emperor [AIR 1924 Cal 476] that bail is not to be wi....
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....1, wherein Hon'ble Supreme Court observed that even economic offences would fall under the category of 'grave offence' and while considering the application for bail in such matters, the Court has to be sensitive to the nature of the allegations made against the accused as well as the term of sentence i.e. prescribed for the offence that the accused is alleged to have committed. It was also observed that the reasonable apprehension of tampering with evidence or apprehension of threat to the complainant or the witnesses as well as character, behavior and standing of the accused and the circumstances that are peculiar to the accused and the larger interest of the public should also be taken into consideration. 14. Reference should also be made to Satender Kumar Antil vs. Central Bureau of Investigation and another, 2022 AIR (Supreme Court) 3386, wherein the Hon'ble Supreme Court dealt extensively with the rights of the accused in economic offences by observing that the law laid down in P. Chidambaram's case (supra) still governed the field. The gravity of the offence, the object of the Special Act and the attending circumstances are a few of the factors to be taken note of along w....
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....sed for grant of regular bail in the proceedings for the offences alleged against him under Sections 132 (1) read with Section 132 (5) of the CGST Act. While observing that the alleged evasion of tax by the accused was to the extent as provided under Section 132 (1) (i) and the punishment provided was imprisonment which might extend to 05 years and fine, the fact that the accused had already undergone incarceration for 04 months and completion of trial was likely to take time and further that the evidence to be tendered was of documentary nature, the Hon'ble Supreme Court had passed an order for release of the accused on bail. In Ashutosh Garg's case (supra), the High Court of Judicature for Rajasthan at Jaipur had dismissed the prayer made by the petitioner, who was accused of creating and operating 294 fake firms and evaded tax liability of Rs.1032 crores. The Hon'ble Supreme Court allowed the Special Leave Petition filed by the accused by taking into consideration the fact that he was in custody for a period of 09 months and that the offence carried maximum punishment for 05 years of imprisonment. It was observed that it was not appropriate to keep him in custody any further. ....
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....ed. However, these cases are distinguishable on the point that in all these cases, punishment of imprisonment was upto life. In Swetanga Pattnaik's case (supra), the bail had been denied since investigation was still pending. In P. V. Ramana Reddy's case (supra), challenge was to summons issued under Section 70 of the GST Act and invocation of penal provisions. A Division Bench of Telangana High Court by observing that the GST regime was at its nascent stage since the law was yet to reach its second anniversary and that there were lot of technical glitches in furnishing of returns and making of ITC claims etc. had rejected the prayer and the order was upheld by the Hon'ble Supreme Court. However, there was no prayer for grant of bail. In Sundeep Mahendra Kumar Sanghvi's case (supra) also, the challenge before the High Court of Gujarat at Ahmedabad was to summons issued by the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence under Section 108 of the Customs Act and a writ petition had been filed. In K. I. Pavunny's case (supra), the question before the Hon'ble Supreme Court was the admissibility in evidence of confessional statement made by an accused before the Customs Officer and the same has ....
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....g trial for commission of any offence under the provisions of that Act. 22. On consideration of the above discussed facts and circumstances and also considering that the alleged offences are punishable with maximum punishment up to 05 years and also keeping in view that in such circumstances, the further detention of the petitioners may not at all be justified since in case of this nature, the evidence to be rendered by the respondent would essentially be documentary and electronic, which will be through official witnesses, due to which, there cannot be any apprehension of tampering, intimidating or influencing the witnesses and further as it appears justified to strike a fine balance between the need for further detention of the petitioner when no custodial interrogation has been claimed at all by the department, this Court considers that the petitioners are entitled to be released on bail but subject to certain conditions. 23. As a result of above discussion, the petitions moved by both the petitioners are hereby allowed and they are ordered to be released on regular bail on their furnishing personal bonds with two sureties in the like amount each to the satisfaction of the....