JAIN AND JAIN Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) INVOKING this court's jurisdiction under art. 226 of the Constitution, this petition seeks various writs and reliefs in respect of proceedings initiated and actually on the move against the petitioners under s. 132 of the I.T. Act, 1961 (hereinafter 'the Act').

(2.) PETITIONER No. 1, M/s. Jain and Jain, is a firm of chartered accountants, with petitioners Nos. 2 to 5 as partners who are closely related to one another, petitioner No. 4 being the uncle of the other petitioners. On the morning (10.30 a. m.) of February 12, 1981, respondent No. 4, C. B. Thadani, ITO, along with other officers and staff, went to the petitioners' office situated at Alankar Building, 208, Samuel Street, Bombay, premises being then closed. Thadani and his party waited there for some time when petitioner No. 3, B. C. Jain, arrived. On his opening the office, Thadani disclosed his identity and produced the warrants of authorisation under s. 132 of the Act read with r. 112 of the rules thereunder. B. C. Jain perused them and signed, with endorsement 'seen and read', sixteen of these out of a total of thirty -five in all. Search then commenced. It closed for the day at 21.00 hours. Search was resumed the next day, February 13, 1981, at 11.15 a. m. While it was still going on, Kapoorchand Champalal, petitioner No. 2, rushed to the High Court, contacted his lawyers and presented at 5 p. m. on the same day (which was a Friday) the present writ petition on which the following interim order was passed:

(3.) ON notice being served on the respondents, three affidavits -in -reply have been filed -one by respondent No. 2, M. L. C. D'Souza, Director of Inspection (Income -tax), Government of India, another by one K.K. Gupta, Assistant Director of Inspection (Intelligence), and a third by respondent No. 4, C. B. Thadani, ITO, in charge of the search. This petition was heard at length and in extenso akin to final hearing thereof with full opportunity to argue all such questions as the parties desired. On February 20, 1981, I passed an order dismissing the petition (with reasons to follow) and permitting the search in question to continue.