Umang Garg S/o Surinder Kumar Garg Vs Union of India (Rajasthan High Court)
In this case, two bail applications were filed under Section 483 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (BNSS), by accused persons facing prosecution initiated by the Directorate General of GST Intelligence (DGGI), Jaipur Zonal Unit, for alleged offences under various provisions of Section 132 of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 (CGST Act).
The prosecution alleged that one accused was involved in wrongful availment and utilization of Input Tax Credit (ITC) amounting to approximately ₹32.30 crore through firms allegedly issuing fake and goods-less invoices. It was contended that invoices were issued in the names of multiple companies and that fraudulent ITC had been availed between February 2024 and April 2025. The other accused was alleged to have acted as an intermediary arranging fake invoices and was accused of operating several fake firms that generated fake ITC exceeding ₹66.52 crore. The DGGI relied upon statements recorded under Section 70 of the CGST Act, WhatsApp chats, electronic devices, forensic analysis, and documentary evidence to establish involvement in issuance of goods-less invoices and passing of fraudulent ITC.
The petitioners argued that the allegations were vague and unsupported by sufficient material. One petitioner contended that he was not a director of two of the companies during the relevant period and had only briefly served as an additional director in another company. The other petitioner argued that no material demonstrated that he generated invoices himself and that no invoicing software, GST utility, server logs, portal access history, forensic metadata, or other electronic infrastructure had been recovered from him. According to the petitioners, the WhatsApp chats merely showed circulation of invoices and not authorship or generation of the documents.
