The Delhi High Court has upheld the validity of a GST Department search of an advocate’s office, emphasising strict data protection measures including the use of cloned data and safeguarding client confidentiality amid ongoing investigations.
The Delhi High Court has upheld a Goods and Services Tax Department search of an advocate’s office and the seizure of his computer and papers, while insisting that investigators use only a cloned copy of the data and keep unrelated client information confidential.
A division bench of Justice Anil Khetarpal and Justice Shail Jain dismissed the challenge to the July 25, 2025 search, saying it had been carried out under valid authority under Section 67(2) of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act. The court said the fact that the premises belonged to a lawyer did not, by itself, make the search unlawful. Reuters-style reporting from legal outlets said the judges also accepted that advocate-client privilege remains protected in law, but cannot become an automatic shield where there is prima facie material suggesting the lawyer himself may have played a role beyond giving legal advice.
The court said its earlier safeguards for the seized CPU should continue to govern the inquiry. The hard drive was to be cloned, with the copy given to the petitioner, and any examination confined to material relevant to the GST probe. Authorities were barred from opening or reviewing data belonging to other clients unless they later obtained permission from the High Court. The bench also noted the petitioner’s claim that some files were deleted remotely during the search, but said that point could be examined in the investigation and did not, on its own, prove wrongdoing.
The judges rejected the argument that the seizure was invalid because the advocate was not given a personal hearing beforehand, and they also dismissed complaints about departmental procedure where no mandatory legal breach had been shown. They noted that the company under investigation later consented to handing over its statutory, financial, accounting, tax and electronic records, but said that consent could not retrospectively cure the original search. Still, they stressed it could not be used to justify access to unrelated third-party client material. The writ petition was dismissed and the GST Department was allowed to continue its inquiry, although the court said its ruling should not be read as authorising unrestricted searches of advocates’ offices or weakening privilege in general.
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