The Madhya Pradesh High Court dealt with a petition filed by a tobacco manufacturing company under Article 226 of the Constitution, raising issues concerning seized documents and adjudication under the GST regime. The Court made significant observations on the maintainability of repetitive petitions and the misuse of judicial process.
The petitioner, a cigarette manufacturing company registered under the Companies Act, was subjected to investigation by the Directorate General of GST Intelligence, Bhopal Zone, for alleged large-scale evasion of GST and excise duty. During searches at its factory premises in Indore, officials found discrepancies suggesting manipulation of power usage data and unaccounted production and clearance of cigarettes.
Subsequently, show-cause notices alleging tax evasion running into crores were issued to the company and others. Earlier, the company had filed a writ petition seeking the return of original documents seized during investigation, which was allowed by the High Court, and later upheld by the Supreme Court with directions to hand over the non-relied documents and certified copies of missing files.
Despite this, the company again approached the High Court seeking certified copies of various reports and statements of 76 officers and permission to cross-examine them.
The counsel for the petitioner argued that since Excise Officers were posted round the clock at the factory premises to monitor raw material inflow, manufacturing, and dispatch of goods, all production-related records were maintained by such officers as part of their statutory duty. Relying on a circular of the Central Board of Excise and Customs dated 24.12.2008, it was submitted that the officers were required to maintain detailed records such as blending registers, cigarette manufacturing accounts, and daily clearance registers. Hence, the petitioner contended that these records, being maintained by the government officers, should be furnished to the company to prepare its defence.
On the other hand, the counsel for the respondent submitted that all relied and non-relied documents had already been provided, and the petitioner was allowed to cross-examine the 11 witnesses whose statements were referred to in the show-cause notice. It was argued that the present petition was filed only to delay the adjudication process, as final orders in respect of other noticees had already been passed, but due to the interim stay in this case, proceedings remained pending.
The Court noted that the reliefs sought in the current petition were identical to those in the earlier one, which had already been decided and upheld by the Apex Court. Since there was no allegation of non-compliance with the earlier directions, the Court held that there was no fresh cause of action.
Rejecting the argument that statutory registers were maintained by excise officers, the Court observed, “Section 35 of the CGST Act, 2017 makes it mandatory for every registered person to maintain true and correct accounts at their principal place of business. Rule 56 further casts an obligation on the registered person to maintain such records. Hence, the contention that all statutory documents were prepared by Excise Officers and must be handed over to the petitioner is wholly baseless.”
The Bench further remarked that the petitioner had already been granted an opportunity to cross-examine witnesses and had availed that right. Therefore, filing another petition on the same grounds was “absolutely misconceived and malafide,” intended merely to stall the adjudication proceedings.
Holding the petition to be not maintainable, the Court dismissed it with exemplary costs of ₹2,00,000, payable to the respondent within four weeks. The Court also noted that such repetitive petitions unnecessarily delay statutory adjudication and burden the judicial process.
Case Title: Elora Tobacco Company Vs. Union of India
Case No.: Writ Petition No. 14694 of 2025
Coram: Justice Vivek Rusia
Advocate for Petitioner: Adv. Abhinav Malhotra
Advocate for Respondent: Adv. Prasanna Prasad
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