Supreme Court Restores Validity of ACB FIRs Registered At Vijayawada; Sets Aside High Court Quashings

A Bench of Justices M.M. Sundresh and Satish Chandra Sharma heard appeals against a batch of High Court orders that had quashed First Information Reports filed by the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB), Central Investigation Unit, Vijayawada on grounds of alleged lack of jurisdiction. The appeals challenged the High Court of Andhra Pradesh’s finding that the ACB office at Vijayawada was not a notified “police station” under Section 2(s) of the Code of Criminal Procedure and that subsequent Government clarifications could not operate retrospectively to validate earlier registrations.

The Court allowed the appeals, set aside the impugned High Court judgment and held that government orders and the statutory regime created by the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014 preserved the force of pre-existing notifications and circulars that treated ACB offices as police stations. The Bench held that the High Court’s approach was “a travesty of justice” and impermissibly technical. The Court, in its reasoning, observed: "This Court took the earlier judgments into consideration and, in fact, dealt with the very same 2014 Act and held that the legal fiction should be so that the existing laws, prior to bifurcation, would continue to be in force in both the States, unless altered, repealed or amended in accordance with law. Any construction to the contrary would defeat the very intent and purpose of the Government Orders, which were given the status of ‘law,’ vide Circular dated 26.05.2014." The Bench directed that the investigations should proceed, granted liberty to challenge charge-sheets on other grounds after investigation, restrained arrest of the respondents in the interim and required final reports to be filed within six months.

Background The dispute arose from several FIRs registered between 2016 and 2020 at the A.C.B., Central Investigation Unit, Vijayawada for offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988. The accused challenged the FIRs before the High Court on the principal ground that the Vijayawada ACB office had not been notified as a “police station” under Section 2(s) CrPC and therefore the registrations were without jurisdiction. The appellants relied on an earlier G.O.Ms. No. 268 (Home PSC) dated 12.09.2003 which declared ACB offices as police stations and on subsequent government circulars and orders issued after the 2014 reorganisation of Andhra Pradesh. The State issued a clarification by G.O.Ms. No.137 dated 14.09.2022 expressly declaring the Joint Director, Central Investigation Unit, ACB, Vijayawada as a police station with jurisdiction over the State of Andhra Pradesh. The High Court, however, struck down the FIRs holding that a Gazette notification under Section 2(s) was necessary and that the 2022 order could not operate retrospectively. The appellants urged reliance on Sections 100–102 of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014 and on settled precedents holding that laws, notifications and administrative orders in force before reorganisation continued to operate unless altered. The Supreme Court concluded that the High Court adopted a hyper‑technical approach, emphasised that “When a Government Order is issued by way of a clarification, there is no question of any retrospective application,” and rejected the view that the earlier government instruments did not have continuing force. The result was that the quashings were set aside; the appeals were allowed; the ACB was permitted to continue and conclude investigations; the Court directed filing of final reports within six months, restrained coercive arrests in the interim, and granted liberty to respondents to raise other defenses after investigation.

Case Details: Case No.: 2026 INSC 37 Case Title: The Joint Director (Rayalaseema), Anti-Corruption Bureau, A.P. & Anr. etc. v. Dayam Peda Ranga Rao etc. Appearances: For the Petitioner(s): Mr. Sidharth Luthra (Senior Counsel); Mr. Siddharth Aggarwal (Counsel) For the Respondent(s): Senior Counsel for respondents (names not specified in the judgment)