The police cannot unilaterally freeze bank accounts under sections concerning seizure or document production. Such actions constitute attachment of property, which requires mandatory judicial oversight and authorization by a competent magistrate to avoid violating the constitutional rights to property, trade, and livelihood.

The Court made the following:

ORDER:

The Writ Petition has been filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India seeking the following relief:-

“…to issue an order or direction more particularly one in the nature of Writ of mandamus declaring the two notices dated i 21112025 u/s 106 BNSS issued by 4rt respondent and notice dated ii 12112025 u/s 94 BNSS issued by 5th respondent as without jurisdiction arbitrary illegal unjust malafide in violation of Article 14 of Constitution of India as well as principles of Natural Justice and consequently direct respondents 6 to 8 to defreeze the accounts of petitioners bearing nos 1 59299494454545 2 59109490444555 3 50100238184931 4 249401000067 5 249401000812 6 006001037352 7 249405001523 8 249405001526 which were frozen in connection with Crime no 132 of 2025 of Patamata police station and to pass…”

2. Heard the learned Counsel for the Petitioner and the learned Assistant Government Pleader for Home.

3. Sri P.Vivek, learned Counsel for the Petitioners submits that the impugned notices directing debit freeze of the Petitioners’ bank accounts are wholly without jurisdiction, arbitrary, and ex-facie illegal. The substratum of the dispute, as borne out from the record, emanates from contractual and commercial dealings relating to land transactions in Visakhapatnam. The belated registration of FIR nearly three years after the last alleged transaction, without preliminary enquiry, is in direct contravention of the binding guidelines laid down by the Hon’ble Supreme Court in Lalita Kumari v. Govt. of U.P ¹(2014) 2 SCC 1. The Respondents, in registering the crime at Patamata Police Station, Vijayawada, despite the entire cause of action arising in Visakhapatnam, have acted beyond territorial jurisdiction, thereby vitiating the very foundation of the proceedings.

4. It is further urged that the action of the Respondent Police in invoking Sections 106 and 94 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (for brevity ‘the BNSS’) to freeze bank accounts is a manifest abuse of process. Section 106 of ‘the BNSS’ contemplates seizure of stolen property, whereas Section 107 of ‘the BNSS’ alone governs attachment of property alleged to be proceeds of crime, and such attachment can only be affected upon orders of the learned Jurisdictional Magistrate. The Respondents, by directing debit freeze without recourse to the learned Magistrate, have arrogated to themselves powers not vested in them under law. Likewise, Section 94 of ‘the BNSS’ merely enables summoning of documents for investigation and does not confer authority to freeze accounts. The impugned notices, therefore, are ultra vires, bereft of statutory sanction, and liable to be set aside.

5. Learned Counsel for the Petitioners would also emphasize that this Court, while granting anticipatory bail to the Petitioners in Criminal Petition No.9451 of 2025, has already observed that the dispute is essentially civil and commercial in nature, custodial interrogation is unnecessary, and serious jurisdictional infirmities exist in the registration of the FIR. In the teeth of such judicial pronouncement, the Respondents’ subsequent action of freezing accounts amounts to coercive pressure to settle civil scores, which is impermissible in law. The continuation of the debit freeze has paralysed the Petitioners’ business operations, obstructed statutory compliances, and inflicted grave financial hardship, thereby infringing their right to livelihood under Article 21