SAYYED M. MASUD Vs. UNION OF INDIA (UOI)

JUDGEMENT

(1.) CRIMINAL Miscellaneous Petition No. 10934/2012 in Writ Petition (Crl.) No. 57 of 2011: Criminal Miscellaneous Petition No. 10934 of 2012 has been filed on behalf of the Union of India in the instant writ petition for modification/vacation of the interim Order passed by this Court in the writ petition on 11th March, 2011. The writ petition had been filed, inter alia, on the question as to whether an offence Under Section of the Customs Act, 1962, would be bailable. The same will be evident from Paragraph (1) of the writ petition. However, in the writ petition itself reference has also been made to investigation undertaken under the provisions of the Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999, and the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002, as far as the Petitioner and his Company, M/s. City Limouzines (India) Limited, were concerned. of course, the main prayer in the writ petition was for the issuance of a writ of mandamus to declare the offence under Section of the Customs Act, 1962 as a bailable offence, which question was, at that point of time, pending determination in Writ Petition (Crl.) No. 74 of 2010, titled as Choith Nanikram Harchandani v. Union of India and Ors. It may be indicated that, subsequently, in the case of Om Prakash and Anr. v. Union of India and Anr. : 2011 (11) SCALE 310 : 2011 (272) E.L.T. 321 (S.C.) : 2011 (24) S.T.R. 257 (S.C.), this Court held that offences under the Customs Act were bailable.

(2.) IT is on the basis of such averments and submissions made that we were given the impression that the alleged offences in respect of which the writ petition had been filed were confined to the provisions of the Customs Act alone. However, in the petition for stay of arrest, the Petitioner prayed for stay of arrest in connection with the subject -matter of File No. T -119 -B/2009/AD (MDB) RKP//ECIR/65/MZO/2010. Having regard to the context in which the writ petition was alleged to have been moved, we had, by our Order of 11th March, 2011, stayed the arrest of the Petitioner in connection with the subject -matter of the said file, presuming that the same would be relating to the offences under the Customs Act, 1962.