HARIKISHAN Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BY this petition under Section 482, Criminal Procedure Code, 1973, the petitioners seek quashing of proceedings of Criminal Case No. 50 of 1992 instituted against them in the Court of the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate (Economic Offences), Indore, filed under Section 276DD of the Income-tax Act, 1961, as it stood before coming into force of the Taxation Laws (Amendment and Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, 1986.

(2.) THE complaint in question against the petitioners has been made on the ground that the petitioners during the financial year 1986-87 (assessment year 1987-88) had taken/accepted certain deposits to the tune of Rs. 44,500 otherwise than by account payee cheques or drafts and which was in violation of the provisions of Section 269SS of the Act. THE sanction for prosecution under Section 279 was accorded on March 30, 1992, and the complaint to the court was made in March, 1992. However, in the meantime, the Amendment Act, 1987, was enacted whereby Section 276DD was omitted and consequential changes were also made in Section 279 with effect from April 1, 1989. THE petitioners moved an application before the learned magistrate seeking dropping of the prosecution on the ground that on the date when the complaint was made, the penal Section 276DD did not exist on the statute book. THE learned magistrate, however, vide its order dated August 31, 1994, rejected the petitioners' application holding that the amendment was not retrospective in effect and that the prosecution in question was saved under the provisions of Section 6 of the General Clauses Act, 1897.

(3.) THE decision of this petition turns on the answer to the question as to whether or not sanction for prosecution could be accorded and the prosecution be launched in the court for the offence committed under Section 276DD on a date on which the section was in existence but omitted subsequently before the sanction for prosecution was accorded and the prosecution was actually launched.