Ashish Bhalla Vs State & Anr. (Delhi High Court)
Ashish Bhalla filed a petition under Section 482 CrPC seeking quashing of FIR No. 06/2023 registered by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW), Delhi, under Sections 406, 420 and 120-B IPC. The Court noted that the complainant had first approached the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) and the Serious Fraud Investigation Office (SFIO) with allegations of fraudulent siphoning of funds by the WTC Group. Pursuant to that complaint, the Central Government assigned the matter to the SFIO for investigation under Section 212 of the Companies Act, 2013. Thereafter, the same complainant submitted another complaint before the EOW containing substantially identical allegations, resulting in registration of the impugned FIR.
The Court examined the scheme of Sections 206 to 212, 436, 447, 448 and 452 of the Companies Act, 2013, and held that Section 212 creates a comprehensive statutory framework for SFIO investigations. It observed that once the Central Government assigns an investigation to the SFIO under Section 212, no other investigating agency can continue investigating offences under the Companies Act arising from the same set of facts. The Court interpreted Sections 212(2), 212(17)(a) and 212(17)(b) harmoniously and held that other investigating agencies are required to transfer relevant documents and information to the SFIO and cannot pursue parallel investigations into the same matters.
