JUDGMENT

Mohammad Rafiq, J. - Writ Petition No. 2031/2018 has been filed by the petitioner, M/s. Sanwaria Sweets Private Limited through its Director, Mr. Ajay Sharda inter alia with the prayer that the action of the officers of the respondent namely Directorate General of Goods and Service Tax Intelligence (for short 'DGGSTI') in conducting search in the premises of the petitioner at Jaipur on 27.08.2017 be declared arbitrary, malicious, motivated and illegal, being contrary to the provisions of the Central Excise Act, 1944 (for short 'the Act of 1944') and also without jurisdiction. It is further prayed that the respondents be directed to return all the documents including original sale/title deeds of various immovable properties taken away on 27.08.2017 during the aforesaid search and Respondent No. 1, Union of India be directed to take action against the officers of the DGGSTI, in particular against Respondent No. 3, Mr. Rajesh Verma for indulging in vexatious search in the premises of the petitioner.

2. Review Petition No. 269/2018 has been filed by Respondent No. 2, DGGSTI and Review Petition No. 270/2018 has been filed by Respondent No. 3, Mr. Rajesh Verma, seeking review of order dated 09.08.2018 passed by Division Bench of this Court whereby the Central Government was directed to act pursuant to prayer clause (C) of the writ petition, i.e. to take action against the officers of Respondent No. 2 and against Respondent No. 3, in terms of Service Rules, for indulging in vexatious search in the premises of the petitioner and not to take any coercive action against the writ petitioner.

3. We have heard Mr. J. K. Mittal, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the writ petitioner and Mr. Satish Kumar Agarwal as also Mr. Kinshuk Jain, learned appearing on behalf of the respondents as well as review petitioners. Mr. J.K. Mittal, learned counsel for the writ petitioner submitted that this Court required the respondents to return the original files seized during search of the premises of the writ petitioner and when they failed to do so, this Court on 09.08.2018 deprecated conduct of the respondents and directed that action be taken against official respondents in terms of prayer Clause (C) of the writ petition and restrained them from taking any coercive action against the writ petitioner. The respondents returned the original files on 26.09.2018, inventory of which was prepared by the respondents in terms of aforesaid order.

4. It is argued that the search conducted by the department was not only arbitrary exercise of power but also malicious and motivated action being in breach of provisions of Section 12F and Section 18 of the Act of 1944 read with section 100(4)(5) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (for short 'Cr.P.C.'). According to the respondents, the search was conducted on 27.08.2017 and record pertaining to various firms and properties were taken away as mentioned in panchnama prepared on that day. However, as per Section 12F of the Act of 1944, only those documents or books or things could be seized, which are "useful for or relevant to any proceedings under this Act,". The aforesaid provision therefore did not allow the respondents to take away any or everything like the title deeds of immovable properties of various firms/companies, which cannot be said to be the documents falling within the scope of that provision.

5. The assertion of the respondents in their counter affidavit that the entries at Serial No. 21 to 24 of the Annexure-A to the panchnama aforesaid were inadvertently typed as photo copies but the fact is that all these documents which were taken away by the respondents mentioned photo copies, without sealing, without recording the number of pages and specific description of the documents of each file. The said action was not inadvertent but was deliberate and when the respondents were rebuked and directed by this Court to return the same, it was at that stage, that the respondents admitted that they s