The Madhya Pradesh High Court has granted bail to an accused person in case of GST evasion, for alleged fabrication of invoices and upload of the same on the GST portal.
An application for bail was made by the applicant under Section 439 Cr.P.C. for grant of bail during trial which provides special powers to High Court or Court of Session to grant bail. It states that a high court or sessions court can release any person accused of an offence on bail and also impose conditions based on which the order will be granted. The applicantis facing trial for offence punishable under Section 409, 467, 468, 120-B and 427 of the IPC.
The applicant faces an allegation that he had received an amount of Rs.6,52,00,000 for supply of pesticides and insecticides and as against this he had made the supply only for an amount of Rs.4,30,00,000 only and failed to make supply against the payment of Rs.2,22,50,000.
On being approached for supply of pesticides against remaining payment, the applicant continued to avoid the same also misbehaved with the complainant. It has been alleged that he fabricated invoices and uploaded the same on the GST portal.
The Counsel for the applicant prayed for bail being granted to the applicant on the following grounds:
- The applicant had himself made a complaint at Police Station in Rajasthan alleging that a sum of Rs.1,35,00,000/- is receivable by the applicant from the complainant but no action was taken.
- The allegation that the invoices have been fabricated, is incorrect because the invoices have been shown in the GST Return-1, which tallies with GST R-3
- The applicant has at most committed offence under Section 132 of the GST Act, which is a bailable offence
- The absence of E-Way Bill is not a conclusive proof of invoices being fabricated or the fact that the supply was not made to the complainant.
- The applicant has been in custody since 28.11.2019 and has now been kept in the jail wherein Covid-19 infected persons have been found.
The Counsel for the State opposed the application for bail and stated that the applicant had prepared fabricated and forged invoices without supplying the material and the particulars of the transport, date of supply etc. have not been mentioned in the GST invoices and in some of the invoices date of supply shown is prior to the date of purchase of the goods
The information extracted from the hard disk that was seized from the applicant does not tally with the ledger kept by the applicant and supports the complainant’s version about receipt of money and non-supply of goods by the complainant. The invoices uploaded by the applicant are bogus as they did not contain details of dispatch etc. and there are no E-Way Bills to show that the supply of material as against the payment of Rs.2,22,50,000/- was made by the applicant.
The Counsel also added that the details relating to criminal antecedents of the applicant have not been received from Rajasthan because of the lock down put by the Central and State Government due to Covid-19 infection.
The Court enquired if the applicant will be willing to deposit Rs. 1 Crore with the trial Court and secure the remaining amount by furnishing the solvent security, to which the counsel for the applicant requested that the amount of deposit be reduced by 50%.
The Court considered that the applicant has been in custody since November 2019 and in the present scenario of lockdown the conclusion of trial is likely to take time, ordered the release of the applicant on bail. The applicant has been directed to furnish a personal bond of Rs.1 Lac and deposit Rs.50 Lacs with the trial Court, to be kept by the trial Court in the Fixed Deposit in a nationalised Bank and also furnish solvent security with the trial Court for the remaining amount of Rs.1,72,50,000/-.
-India Legal Bureau