Person Arrested U/S 69 CGST Act Must Be Communicated Grounds Of Arrest 'In Writing': Delhi High Court

The Delhi High Court has held that grounds of arrest must be furnished to a person arrested under Section 69 of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017, 'in writing'.Justice Anish Dayal held that the Supreme Court's judgments in Pankaj Bansal and Arvind Kejriwal with respect to offence under PMLA and in Prabir Purkayastha with respect to offences under UAPA will also apply to offences under the CGST Act.“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.”The Judge added that its stance is further strengthened by provision of Section 69(2) CGST Act, which stipulates that “the officer authorized to arrest the person shall inform such person of the grounds of arrest”.In the case at hand, Petitioner, the Director of a company was arrested on accusation of availing Input Tax Credit amounting to Rs. 10,76,99,292/- by procuring fake invoices without actual supply of goods.Petitioner argued that there was no need or necessity to arrest him and in any case, pointed out discrepancies in the Arrest Memo. The primary argument of the Petitioner was that he was not supplied the Grounds of Arrest, rendering non-compliance of Section 69(2) CGST Act and Article 22(1) of the Constitution.At the outset, the High Court noted that while the Arrest Memo had an acknowledgement signed by Petitioner stating that the grounds of arrest had been explained to him, no grounds of arrest were furnished to the petitioner in writing.The Respondent agency claimed that their obligation was only to 'inform' the Petitioner about the grounds of arrest, which they did, as is evident from the acknowledgment on the Arrest Memo.It was further contended that the remand application had enough narration, as part of reasons to believe, that would effectively subsume the grounds for arrest; not providing a specific caption 'grounds of arrest' would not be fatal to the arrest itself.Disagreeing, the High Court said, “The communication to the arrestee, as per the Supreme Court, must be clear, categorical, and meaningful, and there is no reason as to why written grounds of arrest could not be given…To contend that arrestee had been “effectively” informed about the grounds of arrest, which would be enough for the arrestee to formulate their arguments during the remand, is a specious argument.”The Court also noted that the remand application, which apparently contained the grounds of arrest, was handed over to the Petitioner just before the remand hearing.Criticising such a practice, the High Court said,“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. ”In view of the above, the arrest of the Petitioner was held illegal and the remand order was set aside.Appearance: Mr. Maninder Singh, Sr. Adv. with Mr. Bobby C., Mr. Pulkit Verma, Mr. Akhil Gupta, Ms. Sanjana Nair, Mr. Gurjass Singh Puri, Mr. Rohit Kheriwal and Mr. Nishant Nain, Advs. for Petitioner; Mr. Anurag Ojha, SSC with Mr. Dipak Raj, Mr. Vipul Kumar, Mr. Karan Aggarwal, Mr. Shubham Kumar and Mr. Deepak Somani, Advs. for RespondentsCase title: Kshitij Ghildiyal v. Director General Of Gst Intelligence, DelhiCitation: 2024 LiveLaw (Del) 1364Case no.: W.P.(CRL) 3770/2024Click Here To Read/Download Order

Person Arrested U/S 69 CGST Act Must Be Communicated Grounds Of Arrest 'In Writing': Delhi High Court

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