Requirement To Communicate Grounds Of Arrest In Writing To GST Accused Is Sacrosanct: Delhi High Court
The Delhi High Court enunciated that the requirement to communicate grounds of arrest in writing to an accused under the Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 (GST Act) is sacrosanct.
The Court was dealing with a Writ Petition filed by the accused for declaring his arrest as illegal, void, and arbitrary.
A Single Bench of Justice Anish Dayal observed, “It is evident from the principles as enunciated by the Supreme Court that the requirement to communicate the grounds of arrest in writing is sacrosanct. It was further stated that a copy of such written grounds was to be furnished to the arrestee as a matter of course, without exception, and at the earliest.”
The Bench added that, when liberty of a person is at stake, investigation/arresting agency must lean on the side of overcaution, exactitude, and punctiliousness, rather than otherwise.
Senior Advocate Maninder Singh appeared on behalf of the Petitioner while SSC Anurag Ojha appeared on behalf of the Respondent.
Factual Background -
The Petitioner was a Director of a private company registered under CGST Act, carrying the business of e-waste management. The Respondent i.e., Director General of GST Intelligence, Delhi authorities carried out a search under Section 67 of CGST Act at the Company’s principal place of business. Allegedly, unaccounted stock was seized and pursuantly, the Petitioner was taken in his own car from premises of the company to the Respondent’s Office. It was alleged that the Petitioner was illegally detained there without any reason or information. It was further alleged that his mobility was restricted, he was not allowed to leave the premises of the Respondent, and his phone was also cloned at Respondent’s premises without his consent.
The Petitioner was arrested and the allegations pertained to availing Input Tax Credit (ITC) by procuring fake invoices with actual supply of goods through the firms operated by the co-accused in contravention of Section 132(1)(c) of CGST Act. He was then produced before the Chief Judicial Magistrate (CJM) along with a remand Application seeking 14 days’ judicial custody. The Petitioner contested the same before the CJM making various submissions; however, the CJM disposed of the remand Application, granting 13 days’ judicial custody. Hence, he was before the High Court.
The High Court in the above context of the case, noted, “A constitutional mandate must be understood and implemented in its right and rational perspective, and not cursorily and casually. Even if assuming, in favour of the prosecution, that the narrative in the remand application amounted to grounds of arrest, furnishing the said application just before the remand hearing would effectively negate and nullify the duty to inform meaningfully and at the earliest.”
The Court further said that a time of about 11 hours would have been adequate for the arrestee to seek legal counsel and to prepare his defence based upon a crystallised set of ‘grounds of arrest’.
“The Supreme Court has frowned upon ‘general’ grounds of arrest, stating that they had to be highly specific in nature. No such effort was made at the stage of arrest or immediately thereafter, and therefore, would vitiate the arrest itself, amounting to an infraction of the petitioner’s right”, it also noted.
The Court observed that an argument was taken before the Remand Court relating to non-supply of the written grounds of arrest; however, this was not appreciated and addressed in any amount of detail.
“The Magistrate effectively noted that “grounds of arrest explained to the accused persons” and that “IO has completed codal requirements and shown justifiable grounds of arrest”. This was clearly not sufficient and amounted to a mechanical order without application of mind to the issue which was raised”, it added.
The Court said that, while the second summons was generated, the summons itself strangely shows the signatures of the officer as of 27th November 2024 and this attempt, as per Petitioner, of having detained him without any paperwork, and then creating the paperwork subsequently to cover up the tracks.
“The discrepancy in these summons does point to the respondent’s mismanagement of the arrest process. It also throws a serious doubt on the aspect of detention of the petitioner through 28th November 2024 and 29th November 2024, that too, without proper paperwork. … It does indicate that the respondent agency was amiss in not punctiliously following the arrest procedure, as mandated by law, meant to safeguard the rights of the arrestee”, it concluded.
Accordingly, the High Court allowed the Petition, held the arrest illegal, and set aside the arrest.
Cause Title- Kshitij Ghildiyal v. Director General of GST Intelligence, Delhi (Neutral Citation: 2024:DHC:9752)
Appearance:
Petitioner: Senior Advocate Maninder Singh, Advocates Bobby C., Pulkit Verma, Akhil Gupta, Sanjana Nair, Gurjass Singh Puri, Rohit Kheriwal, and Nishant Nain.
Respondent: SSC Anurag Ojha, Advocates Dipak Raj, Vipul Kumar, Karan Aggarwal, Shubham Kumar, and Deepak Somani.
