Gujarat High Court
Buckbox Infotech Private Ltd. Through ... vs Director General Of Gst Intelligence ... on 23 February, 2026
Author: A.S. Supehia
Bench: A.S. Supehia
NEUTRAL CITATION
C/SCA/18147/2025 JUDGMENT DATED: 23/02/2026
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IN THE HIGH COURT OF GUJARAT AT AHMEDABAD
R/SPECIAL CIVIL APPLICATION NO.18147 of 2025
FOR APPROVAL AND SIGNATURE:
HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE A.S. SUPEHIA
and
HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE PRANAV TRIVEDI
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Approved for Reporting Yes No
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BUCKBOX INFOTECH PRIVATE LTD. THROUGH VISMAY GAUTAM BHATT
Versus
DIRECTOR GENERAL OF GST INTELLIGENCE THROUGH CONCERNED
OFFICER & ORS.
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Appearance:
MR.JAY S SHAH(7244) for the Petitioner(s) No. 1
VIJAY H PATEL(7361) for the Petitioner(s) No. 1
MR NEEL P LAKHANI(10679) for the Respondent(s) No. 1
NOTICE SERVED BY DS for the Respondent(s) No. 2
TIRTH NAYAK(8563) for the Respondent(s) No. 3
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CORAM:HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE A.S. SUPEHIA
and
HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE PRANAV TRIVEDI
Date : 23/02/2026
ORAL JUDGMENT
(PER : HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE A.S. SUPEHIA)
1. RULE. Learned Senior Standing Counsel Mr. Tirth Nayak waives service of notice of rule on behalf of the respondent. Since a short issue is involved in the writ petition, the same was heard extensively and is finally decided today by this present judgment and order.
2. We had already heard the learned advocates for the respective parties at length and the matter was kept today only for ascertaining that as to whether the current bank account of the petitioner which has been attached can be de-freezed. This Court on 17.02.2026 passed the following order :-
"After the matter was argued at length and we were about to dismiss the writ petition, at this stage, learned advocate Mr. Vijay Patel for the petitioner has submitted that the current bank account of the Page 1 of 6 Uploaded by PHALGUNI PATEL(HC00175) on Thu Mar 05 2026 Downloaded on : Sat Mar 14 04:34:38 IST 2026 NEUTRAL CITATION C/SCA/18147/2025 JUDGMENT DATED: 23/02/2026 undefined petitioner bearing 13010200004242, IFSC Code No. IBKL0000130, maintained with IDBI Bank, may be released.
Learned Senior Standing Counsel Mr. Tirth Nayak shall take instructions in this regard.
The matter is ordered to be listed on 23.02.2026, on top of the Board."
3. In the present writ petition, the petitioner has prayed for the following reliefs:
"7(A) This Hon'ble Court may be pleased to issue a writ of certiorari or any other appropriate writ, order or direction in the nature thereof, quashing and setting aside the attachment order dated 05.11.2025 (Annexure-P1) passed by the respondent no. 1, in the interest of justice.
(AA) Your Lordship may be pleased to issue writ of certiorari or any other appropriate writ, order or direction quashing and setting aside the order dated 01.02.2026 passed by the respondent no. 1 under Section 83 of the Act (Annexure-P1A)."
4. It is the case of the petitioner that the petitioner is providing technology services and earns a service/transaction fee for the services provided to its clients. The petitioner is registered with National Securities Depository Limited (NSDL) payment bank for payout services and an agreement to that effect is also drawn. The petitioner has registered itself with the GST regime of the State of Gujarat. It is the case of the petitioner that the petitioner was approached by M/s.Digihub Unique Tech Solutions Pvt. Ltd. (Digihub) which sought to avail the petitioner's services as Technology Service Provider (TSP) to facilitate its payout transactions routed by the respondent no. 2 Bank and NSDL payments bank. Accordingly, a Dedicated Merchant Agreement dated 12.09.2025 was executed between the Digihub and the petitioner.
4.1. It is the case of the petitioner for facilitating the financial transactions for payment, respondent no. 2, as per its internal policy in consonance with the Regulations governing the same, opened a current account in the name of the petitioner bearing no. 130102000042422 and Virtual Account Number facility (VAN) was enabled. The said account is Page 2 of 6 Uploaded by PHALGUNI PATEL(HC00175) on Thu Mar 05 2026 Downloaded on : Sat Mar 14 04:34:38 IST 2026 NEUTRAL CITATION C/SCA/18147/2025 JUDGMENT DATED: 23/02/2026 undefined used for the purpose of updating the electronic ledger of any client/merchant/vendor to ensure operational and financial accuracy. Further, any credit disbursement to a set of recipients and beneficiaries, as specified by them, is processed through NSDL payments bank.
4.2. Accordingly, the declaration-cum-undertaking dated 12.09.2025 has be obtained by the petitioner from Digihub. The petitioner accordingly earned Rs.2,24,545/- as the commission against the total transaction of Rs.4,56,13,562/- through its platform.
4.3. It appears that the respondent no. 1 noticed the tax evasion at the end of Digihub and accordingly questioned the entire transaction done by the Digihub through the present petitioner. Thereafter, a provisional attachment order dated 05.11.2025 under Section 83 of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 (for short "CGST Act") was ordered and accordingly the Current Account and Virtual account maintained by the petitioner in respondent no. 2 - IDBI Bank Limited were freezed. Hence, this petition.
5. Learned advocate Mr. Vijay H. Patel appearing for the petitioner has submitted that the Digihub being the original source of fund and respondent no. 2 and NSDL being the banker actually are involved in transmitting the fund to the end beneficiaries, who are the necessary parties who can be appropriately inquired, insofar as the nature of the fund transmitted and Digihub's tax evasion, if any and as such the petitioner's account cannot be freezed or attached. It is submitted that the Digihub is a third party and is one of the merchant/vendor/client on board of the petitioner's portal and as no proceedings under Sections 62, 63, 64, 67, 73 and 74 of the CGST Act are pending against the petitioner and hence, there is no jurisdiction conferred upon the respondent no. 1 to invoke provision of Section 83 of the CGST Act against the petitioner.
5.1. It is submitted that even after some personal meeting was arranged with the respondent no. 1 and the relevant documents were also furnished, Page 3 of 6 Uploaded by PHALGUNI PATEL(HC00175) on Thu Mar 05 2026 Downloaded on : Sat Mar 14 04:34:38 IST 2026 NEUTRAL CITATION C/SCA/18147/2025 JUDGMENT DATED: 23/02/2026 undefined however, the account was not de-freezed. It is submitted that summons under Section 70 of the CGST Act was issued to the petitioner to provide details of its clients account and to remain present on 15.12.2025 and accordingly the personal visit was also made by the petitioner and the entire details were narrated and explained to the officers of the respondent no. 1. It is further submitted that requisite documents were also furnished, however, the attachment of the bank account has not yet been lifted. It is thus submitted that the action of the respondent no.1 in freezing the account is violative of Articles 14 and 19 (1)(g) of the Constitution of India and that too, on the basis of the some alleged tax evasion or fraud committed by Digihub. Thus, it is urged that since the petitioner is acting as a Technology Service Provider without any specific right to process any payments and is only entitled to the service/transaction fee for commission cannot be roped in for the alleged tax evasion by the Digihub who has transmitted the funds in the other account. It is, therefore, submitted that Digihub is involved in online gaming services and there is no allegation against the present petitioner and the petitioner was not aware of the business of Digihub and hence the account of the petitioner is required to be defreezed by setting aside the impugned order dated 01.02.2026.
6. Vehemently opposing the present petition, learned Senior Standing Counsel Mr. Tirth Nayak appearing for the respondent while referring to the affidavit-in-reply has pointed out the modus operandi of the present petitioner and Digihub. It is submitted that the investigation of the respondent categorically revealed that the petitioner in the GST registration has shown themselves as Service Provider of Information, Technology consulting and support services. It is submitted that the authorities had found out that the Bank Accounts and Unique Transaction References (UTRs) in which payouts was made by the petitioner were wrong and consequently, the ultimate beneficiary bank accounts into which the alleged online gaming proceeds originating from M/s. Digihub Unique Tech Solutions Pvt. Ltd., were subsequently routed through the Page 4 of 6 Uploaded by PHALGUNI PATEL(HC00175) on Thu Mar 05 2026 Downloaded on : Sat Mar 14 04:34:38 IST 2026 NEUTRAL CITATION C/SCA/18147/2025 JUDGMENT DATED: 23/02/2026 undefined petitioner's bank accounts. It is submitted that the petitioner failed to verify the credentials of the Digihub from its website where Digihub has shown himself as E-Commerce operator, however, it turned out to be gaming platform and projected themselves involved in the business of Payout Services as per the Line of Business and Use Case Declaration.
6.1. Learned Senior Standing Counsel Mr. Tirth Nayak has also further submitted that the Digihub is involved in the collection and distribution of money generated through online gaming and betting activities and further used their Payout Services to distribute such funds. It is further contended that the petitioner has admitted inconsistencies and accepted the error in drafting the agreement. Further, on perusal of the statements of the Directors of Digihub, the petitioner admitted before the authorities that M/s. Digihub Tech Solution Pvt. Ltd. was providing pay-in services to online gaming/betting merchants and the funds for which payouts were made by Buckbox appears to have been generated from online gaming/betting activities. Hence, it is apparent that no GST has been paid on providing this gaming/betting service resulting into loss of Government revenue. It is thus, submitted that there has been sheer negligence on the part of the petitioner as they have not verified the website of their merchants, exact nature of business of the merchant, GST registration and returns or the sample invoices of their merchants resulting in GST evasion. It is further urged that the respondent is currently in the process of analyzing the bank account of all who are involved in online gaming and betting services and accordingly, E-mails dated 21.01.2026 were written to the corresponding banks of top 15 bank accounts in which payouts were made asking the banks to provide the bank statement and KYC details of the bank accounts and whether the said account has ever been identified or flagged as suspicious, or linked to mule account activity or subjected to any debit freeze, lien or restriction. Thus, it is submitted that looking to the overall scam which involved the present petitioner directly, at this stage the bank account which has been freezed cannot be ordered to be Page 5 of 6 Uploaded by PHALGUNI PATEL(HC00175) on Thu Mar 05 2026 Downloaded on : Sat Mar 14 04:34:38 IST 2026 NEUTRAL CITATION C/SCA/18147/2025 JUDGMENT DATED: 23/02/2026 undefined defreezed unless the entire investigation is over.
7. Having heard the learned advocates for the respective parties at length, the facts narrated herein-above are not in dispute. M/s. Digihub Unique Tech Solutions Pvt. Ltd., which has indulged itself into gaming and betting services though the platform of present petitioner, using its bank account which has been freezed by the respondent authorities is established from the record. From the pleadings and documentary evidence, it is noticed by us that there is list of 35,064 bank accounts in which the payouts were made by the petitioner and they are currently under process of analyzing such bank account by calling out the details from all the bank account in which the money has been lending. It appears that during the investigation, the petitioner has admitted about non verification of the credentials of the Digihub and it allowed its platform for illegal activities of online gaming and betting resulting into loss of Government revenue. Merely because the petitioner is called for an undertaking by Digihub cannot satisfied the requirement of law. The petitioner was supposed to verify the credentials of Digihub,and could not have exclusively relied on the undertaking. The petitioner did not even bother to verify the actual business from the website or by calling upon Digihub to submit necessary invoices to show the actual nature of business. Thus, looking to the enormity of the transactions involved, and the stage of the investigation, which is still in progress, we are not inclined to de-freeze the account of the petitioner, from which the entire dubious transactions have taken place.
8. For the foregoing reasons, the writ petition fails. Hence, the same stands dismissed. Rule is discharged. No order as to costs.
(A. S. SUPEHIA, J) (PRANAV TRIVEDI,J) phalguni/3 Page 6 of 6 Uploaded by PHALGUNI PATEL(HC00175) on Thu Mar 05 2026 Downloaded on : Sat Mar 14 04:34:38 IST 2026