FIR against a chartered accountant quashed where the complaint disclosed no offence at all
Justice Biswajit Palit found the FIR was registered on a misconception of facts and held that letting the proceeding continue would be an abuse of the process of the court.
A chartered accountant facing an FIR under five sections of the Indian Penal Code, including criminal breach of trust and extortion, has had the whole proceeding quashed by the Tripura High Court. Justice Biswajit Palit held that the contents of the FIR disclose no cognizable offence, that none of the provisions invoked is attracted against him, and that there was no justification for the complaining authority to lodge it at all. The petitioner was discharged, and the judgment is marked fit for reporting.
A petition under Section 482
The petition, Crl.P. No. 25 of 2025, was filed under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, corresponding to Section 528 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, to quash West Agartala police station case No. 041 of 2025. That case had been registered under Sections 167, 193, 384, 420 and 409 of the Indian Penal Code.
The second respondent, who set the matter in motion, holds the post of Officer on Special Duty at the Tripura Medical College and Dr. BRAM Teaching Hospital in Agartala. The petitioner is a chartered accountant. Mr. Pijush Kanti Biswas, senior advocate, with Mr. Rishiraj Nath appeared for him; Mr. Raju Datta, Public Prosecutor, appeared for the State, and Mr. Debalay Bhattacharya, senior advocate, with Mr. Samar Das for the complainant. The matter was heard on 17 September 2026 and the judgment and order delivered on 24 September 2026.
Form 10BB, Form 10B, and a circular noticed late
The dispute behind the FIR is a dispute about which form the audit report belonged in. The petitioner's firm had audited Tripura Medical College for a period. By a memorandum of 6 July 2022 the College's Chief Executive Officer asked the firm to submit the return in Form No. 10BB under the Income Tax Act, 1961 up to the financial year 2022-23, on stated charges, and renewed the firm's appointment by the same document.
More than two years later, on 28 November 2024, the second respondent told the firm that the audit report for the financial year 2022-23 and assessment year 2023-24 had been erroneously filed in Form 10BB and asked for e-filing in Form 10B instead. The firm replied the same day, asking the College to find another auditor and pointing out that it had filed in Form 10BB in accordance with the 2022 memorandum. The College pressed the point again on 2 and 3 December 2024, asking for a revised return and intimating that the bill involved be submitted for payment.
In an affidavit sworn on 28 April 2025 the firm set out the explanation the judgment treats as answering the matter. A Central Board of Direct Taxes circular dated 7 October 2024, extending the due date for submission of the audit report, came to the firm's notice only in the first week of December 2024. It then obtained the audit report in Form 10B on 7 December 2024 and filed it electronically on 17 December 2024.
What the court found missing
Justice Palit went through the papers relied on and found nothing to support the charge. There was no evidence of any criminal breach of trust of the kind the complainant had alleged in the FIR. Nowhere in the material could the court find any lapse on the petitioner's part in discharging his duties as a chartered accountant firm. The conclusion it reached was that the FIR had been registered against him on some misconception of facts and without any basis.
On the delay in filing the return, which lay at the bottom of the complaint, the judgment makes two observations. If there was any delay, there might well be a provision in the Act allowing the return to be submitted later subject to a proper explanation. And from the contents of the petitioner's own sworn statement, the reasons had been properly explained.
A case cited for the complainant, reported in the 2025 LiveLaw Supreme Court series, was found to turn on facts totally different from those of this FIR. As for Bhajan Lal, which senior counsel for the complainant had relied on, the court held that it rather supports the petitioner's case, and that the other citation offered in no way supports the complainant.
Order
Holding this to be a fit case for the exercise of jurisdiction under Section 482 of the Code, now Section 528 of the BNSS, and that allowing the proceeding to continue would be an abuse of the process of the court, Justice Palit allowed the petition. The entire proceeding of West Agartala police station case No. 041 of 2025 under Sections 167, 193, 384, 420 and 409 of the Indian Penal Code was set aside and quashed, and the petitioner-accused discharged from the case. The record was directed to be sent down to the trial court with a copy of the order, and a copy to be supplied to the investigating officer through the Public Prosecutor. Pending applications stood disposed of.