Bail in economic offences: stricter scrutiny where circumstantial financial links to proceeds of crime risk investigation and public interest.
The court examined bail appropriateness where applicants allegedly knowingly received and concealed proceeds from a large-scale GST fraud involving fake registrations and bogus invoices. It treated unexplained transactions as strong circumstantial evidence of complicity and applied a heightened bail regime for serious economic offences, weighing gravity of offence, public fund loss, evidence strength and risk of tampering. Gender or familial ties were held insufficient to justify leniency when individuals are shown to have benefited from proceeds of crime.