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8. This court specifically asked Ld. APP for the CBI as to what are the offences/crimes which come within the purview of "heinous crimes", to CBI Vs. Surender Kappor etc                                                                    Page no. 4 of 17 which he replied that the nomenclature "heinous crime" has not been defined in the CBI Manual. He orally tried to satisfy that such cases are like murder, rape, kidnapping, ransom, corruption, etc. This Court opined that there was no clarity as regards the period of punishment of a heinous crime, therefore, it was felt that it is not possible to determine whether the offences of cheating, fraud and forgery come in the category of heinous crime or not.

9. The Ld. APP for CBI further argued that the CBI does not generally arrest accused persons in offences of cheating, fraud and forgery since the investigation requires lengthy time and if the accused persons are arrested, then the investigation is required to be completed within 60-90 days as per Section 167 of Cr.P.C. which creates hurdles in investigation of cases.

10. The aforesaid argument appears to be logical from the practical point of view but it is not based on law. Further, this court had observed that in many cases CBI did not adopt uniform approach and even arrested many persons in similar offences of cheating, fraud and forgery which is seen from the court records as well as various Press Releases published on the website of CBI.

11. Even this Court scrutinized all the charge-sheets pertaining to the CBI cases pending in the East District where the undersigned is exercising jurisdiction and it has been observed that out of total 53 files, 47 cases pertain to the offences involving cheating, fraud, forgery etc.

12. Out of 47 cases of cheating, in only 11 cases, the CBI had arrested the accused persons. It shows percentage of arrest as 23.40%.

The relevant legal position

13. After the enactment of the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act 1946, the superintendence of the S.P.E. was transferred to the Ministry of CBI Vs. Surender Kappor etc                                                                    Page no. 5 of 17 Home Affairs. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) was established vide Resolution No.4/31/61T, dated 1st April, 1963 passed by Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India.

14. The mandate of CBI has been expanded over the years and today it handles investigation of variety of serious cases, viz. Corruption in govt. offices, murders, kidnappings, cheating, fraud, forgery, criminal breach of trust, etc.

15. The CBI (CRIME) Manual (published in 2005) provides the guidelines of general practice. Chapter 12 of the said Manual speaks about the procedure of arrest, custody, bail and remand and the relevant extracts are as under:

"CHAPTER 12 - ARRESTS, CUSTODY, BAIL & REMAND.