IMPORTANT POINT
The main legal point established in the judgment is the requirement of previous permission from the Commissioner to prosecute under the GST Act and the discretion of the court in granting anticipatory bail.

JUDGMENT :

Heard learned Senior Counsel Mr.Jal S Unwala with Mr.Darshan M Varandani, learned advocate for the applicant and learned APP Mr.Soham Joshi, for respondent – State.

2. By way of the present petition under Section 438 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, the petitioner has prayed to release him on anticipatory bail in case of his arrest in connection with the FIR registered as C.R. No.11205032231414/2023 registered with the Mundra Police Station, Kutch for the offence punishable under Sections 420, 465, 467, 468, 120(B), 201, 472 and 114 of the Indian Penal Code.

3. It is the case of the prosecution in FIR that accused persons with a view to financial gain and with an intention of committing cheating with the Government by making evasion of tax amount had created a forged and fabricated bills of purchase of betel nuts and used them as if they are true and genuine for creating forged documentary evidence and thereby committed the aforesaid offence for which the FIR came to be filed against the accused persons as narrated in the FIR in detail.

4. It is sought to be submitted by learned Senior Counsel Mr.Jal Unwala that petitioner is a lady accused living at Delhi and she is not active partner in Forfox Company Pvt Ltd. (for short ‘the Company’) He would further submit that allegations are made in the FIR to the extent that by forging documents and placing them as genuine one, the said company made evasion of GST running in lacks of rupees. He would submit that though principal allegations is of evasion of duty, GST Department has not issued any notice to the company. He would further submit that though it is alleged that under the pretext of importing salt, betel nuts are imported as to avoid the GST upon betel nuts which is higher than the GST on salt, the concerned GST Department has not registered any case and commenced any proceedings, even did not issue single notice to the company.

4.1 Learned Senior Counsel Mr.Jal S Unwala would further submit that active partners are given regular bail by the concerned Court and therefore principle of parity would attract in the present case. He would further submit that one of the accused viz., Mr.Anil Tarun Pandit had filed FIR against the police officers working in crime branch at Gandhidham for the offences punishable under Sections 365, 342, 384, 120-B and 114 of the IPC and under Sections 7, 8, 12, 13 and 13(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act and thus the police has taken the revengeful action. He would further submit that in this FIR some of the police officials are behind bars and some of them denied bail and thus police has with a view to take revenge filed the present FIR, falsely implicating the present petitioner.

4.2 Learned Senior Counsel Mr.Jal Unwala would further submit that under Section 132 of the GST Act, punishment of certain offences are defined which may extend to five years or with fine and in view of sub-section (6) of Section 132, the person cannot be prosecuted for any offence under the GST Act; except with the previous sanction of Commissioner. He would further submit that though in the present case FIR is filed under the various provisions of IPC, in true sense it is the FIR for evasion of tax benefits and therefore the GST Act would also be attracted in the present case and in absence of any previous permission from the Commissioner to prosecute the petitioner, launching of prosecution against the petitioner itself is invalid and thus the petitioner may be enlarged on anticipatory bail.

4.3 Learned Senior Counsel Mr.Jal S Unwala would further submit that petitioner is readily available for investigation and would join the investigation as and when required. There are no antecedents against her and therefore there is no flight risk if the petitioner is enlarged on anticipatory bail.

4.4 Upon above submissions, learned Senior Counsel Mr.Jal Unwala prayed to grant anticipatory bail to the petitioner.

5. Per contra, learned APP objecting to grant of thi