Central Excise Act, 1944 – ss.9, 9AA – Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 – ss.245(2), 482 – Continuation of parallel adjudication proceedings and criminal proceedings – Legality – Criminal proceedings initiated against the appellants u/ss.9 and 9AA of the 1944 Act – Discharge application by the appellants on the ground that quashing of the departmental proceedings initiated by the respondentdepartment against the appellant by the High Court in the Writ, on the similar grounds, the criminal proceedings are not sustainable against the appellants – Dismissed by the trial court holding that adjudication and prosecution were independent processes and that the appellants had not yet been absolved of the underlying liabilities in the departmental proceedings – Revision thereagainst dismissed by the High Court – Interference with:
Held: No bar on parallel proceedings, with one being by the Department and the other being criminal in nature, under the 1944 Act – Direction for de novo proceedings on technical or procedural grounds cannot be assumed to be in equivalence to having been set-aside on merits, when it was specifically mentioned that the merits have not been considered – Plea of the appellant that nonexistent Order dated 31.03.2011 was set aside, even assuming it to be so, it is clear from the materials on record that investigation and the complaint are still in sustenance against the appellants – Contents of the complaint reveal that no reliance placed on the now-set aside Order dated 31.03.2011 rather it was only referred as an addendum – Irregularities which came to light on search and the contents of the investigation report, are sufficient to observe and opine prima facie on the existence of allegations against the appellants, at the time of the consideration made by the trial court justifying the passing of the summoning order – Even the contention on the conditional stay of the subsequent Order passed by the Commissioner of Central Excise, by the High Court does not come to the assistance of the appellants – Furthermore, it cannot be said that the allegations for the purpose of criminal complaint, were rendered “groundless” – Proceedings by the respondent-Department were passed on merits and not on technical foundation – Contentions raised by the appellants on jurisprudence of discharge misconceived and outside the scope of adjudication – Contents of the complaint prima facie makes out an offence under the statute for which it had been preferred – Having perused the alleged conduct and the orders passed by the concerned authorities and the courts below, the authorities relied upon by the appellants are unable to substantiate their claim – Impugned judgment passed by the High Court does not call for interference. [Paras 28-36]
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Headnotes prepared by: Nidhi Jain (2023) 15 SCC 502 (2014) 11 SCC 709. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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