The High Court of Punjab and Haryana granted anticipatory bail to a 24-year-old youth accused of allegedly involved in fabricating the evidence with a view to evade tax to the tune of over Rs 4 crore.
In December 2019, the Central Sector 17 Police Station in Chandigarh filed a case against accused Abhishek Modgil under Sections 420, 467, 468, 471 and 120-B of the IPC on a complaint filed by the Excise and Taxation Officer of Chandigarh.
As per allegations in the FIR, the petitioner is the proprietor of M/s Mahadev Metals. The petitioner obtained GST registration and had taxable supplies/transactions of goods to the tune of Rs.20,46,52,098/-. He is stated to have committed tax evasion to the tune of Rs.4,02,00,136/- by generating bogus invoices of sales and purchases.
The accused in the FIR is identified as the proprietor of Mahadev Metals, a company trading in iron and steel goods, located at Dariya in Chandigarh. However, the complaint states that no business activity was carried out from the premises.
The Council on behalf of petitioner contended that the petitioner is a young boy of 24 years, just a matriculate and is not even educated enough to understand or carry out transactions of such high magnitude running into more than Rs. 20 crores. He has been simply made a scapegoat.
It was further argued by the counsel of the petitioner that the identity documents of the petitioner were misused and a dummy firm was created, wherein alleged bogus entries were made to evade the government taxes. He further submits that the petitioner has nothing to do with these transactions and he is ready to join the investigation. According to him, the case is based on documentary evidence, which is in police possession and custodial interrogation of the petitioner is not required.
The Single Judge bench of Justice Arun Monga in the light of the arguments granted anticipatory bail to a 24-year-old youth accused of committing tax evasion to the tune of over Rs 4 crore.
“The petitioner is ordered to be released on anticipatory bail on his furnishing bail bonds and surety bonds of local and sound surety, to the satisfaction of Chief Judicial Magistrate/ Duty Magistrate, Chandigarh, subject to his complying with provisions contained in Section 438(2) Cr.P.C. On his doing so, he shall join the investigation and shall appear before the Investigating Officer as and when called to do so and would cooperate in the investigation, failing which the State/UT is at liberty to approach this Court seeking cancellation of protection granted to the petitioner,” the court-ordered.
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