The Madras High Court on Monday denied bail to three Chennai based jewellers who obtained customs duty free gold bars weighing 218 kg under a central scheme for those who export gold jewels, without selling them in the domestic market, but cheated the State exchequer by exporting gold coated copper jewellery under a false declaration that they were 22 carat gold jewels.
Justice G. Jayachandran refused to order release of Deepak G. Siroya of Siroya Jewellers, Santosh Kothari of Shree Kalyan Jewellery and Sunil Parmar of Sunil Jewellery considering the ramification of the offence and the design conceived by the petitioners to evade custom duty. He said the release of the petitioners might lead to tampering of witnesses and hence they could not be granted bail.
“It is for the courts to balance the nation’s economic interest as against the individual personal liberty. Not in all cases, the period of incarceration alone matters while deciding a bail plea. The stage of investigation, the ramification of the crime, its network and the possibility of screening vital links if the petitioners are let out on bail are also the factors to be taken into consideration,” the judge observed.
In the instant case, release of the petitioners on bail would not be conducive for investigation, he added after recording the strong objections raised to grant of bail by N.P. Kumar, Special Public Prosecutor for the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI). The prosecutor told the court that the illegality came to light when the petitioners were caught red handed while trying to export copper bangles to Dubai by declaring them as gold.
An inquiry revealed that the petitioners had obtained duty free gold bars from HDFC Bank, sent them to jewel manufacturers in Gujarat and Kolkata. The manufacturers were asked to create hollow gold bangles and stuff them with copper. The rest of the gold was illegally diverted to the domestic market for cash sales. The fake gold bangles were exported to Dubai with the connivance of the consignees over there and the customs officials here.
