The main legal point established in the judgment is that the procedure for freezing bank accounts under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, specifically Section 25, is directory in nature, and alternative remedies under the Code of Criminal Procedure and other provisions of the Act are available to seek relief.

JUDGMENT :

Heard Mr. Indrajit Sinha assisted by Mr. Shashank S. Prasad, Mr. Rishav Kumar and Ms. Anjali Sinha, learned counsel for the petitioner, Mr. Amit Kumar Das assisted by Mr. Saurav Kumar and Ms. Zeenat Malick, learned counsel for the respondent-NIA and Mr. Sumit Prakash, learned counsel for respondent no.6.

2. This petition has been filed for direction upon the respondents to defreeze the bank accounts of the petitioner being account os.30406000756-State Bank of India, Chandwa Branch, 11450762634 and 37476169280-State Bank of India, Latehar Branch, 30113464338-State Bank of India, Harmu Branch, 11112107708-State Bank of India, Daltonganj Branch and 5342002100000030-Punjab National Bank, Chandwa Branch, pending in the court of the learned Additional Judicial Commissioner-XVI, Ranchi cum Special N.I.A. Court, Ranchi.

3. The FIR being Chandwa P.S. Case No.158 of 2019 was lodged against Maoist Ravindra Ganjhu and others. Thereafter, National Investigation Agency, New Delhi re-registered the case as RC/25/2020/NIA/DLI. The case of the prosecution is that on 22.11.2019 at approx 20:00 hours, the police belonging to the Chandwa Police Station were on a patrolling duty. The vehicle which was TATA Safari, bearing Registration No. JH-19B-0716, stopped at Lukuiya More at Chandwa. The cadres of banned terrorist organization i.e. CPI (Maoist), who were waiting in advance, fired continuously at the police patrolling party and killed 4 police personnel. Later they looted the Arms and Ammunition which were issued by the Government, being one pistol, ten rounds of 9 mm Ammunition, three .303 Rifles, with 150 rounds from the martyred police personnel and thereafter raised slogans of Maowadi Zindabad and escaped from the place of incident. Later, on of the Home Guard namely Dinesh Ram who had escaped un-hurt, went to Chandwa Police Station and filed a complaint against 18 named accused persons and some unknown persons.

4. Mr. Indrajit Sinha, learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that the charge-sheet was submitted on 02.07.2020 against six accused persons and thereafter with compliance to the order dated 22.06.2020, National Investigation Agency (NIA) had re-registered the said Chandwa P.S. Case No.158 of 2019 on 24.06.2020. On 30.04.2021, the NIA submitted its 1st supplementary charge-sheet against Mritunjay Singh @ Sonu Singh and others. He submitted that the accused Mritunjay Singh @ Sonu Singh was one of the partners of M/s Santosh Construction. The petitioner-M/s Santosh Construction is a class 1 Government contractor, working for the last 40 years and the entire accounts of the petitioner is lying with respondent nos. 2 to 6, who are bankers of the accounts in question. He further submitted that the petitioner approached respondent nos. 2 to 6 for transaction then it was informed that as per the instruction of respondent-NIA, entire accounts of the petitioner have been frozen as investigation is going on. The respondent nos. 2 to 6 served a letter with regard to freezing of the accounts dated 11.02.2021 and 08.02.2021 respectively. He also submitted that the petitioner was not communicated of such freezing of bank accounts or served with any such copy of the order of seizure of property. He further elaborated his argument by way of submitting that it is the specific case of the petitioner that because of the illegal and unlawful freezing of the accounts, the petitioner is facing great difficulties in executing the subsisting contracts and has been receiving notices from various statutory authorities/Government departments and other institutions for payment of dues, which was unable to meet. He further submitted that the petitioner is unable to make payments to its employees or labours and in that background, this writ petition has been filed. He also submitted that admittedly, the present proceeding has been initiated against the partner of the petitioner firm under the provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 196