Offences & Penalties

Relevancy of statements under certain circumstances

Section 136, CGST Act

Chapter 19 Text as on 2026-09-05 Source CBIC

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Section 136 makes statements recorded during inquiry relevant and admissible in prosecution in specified circumstances.

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Reproduced from the CBIC text. We explain it above — but you should always be able to read it yourself.

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* Section 136. Relevancy of statements under certain circumstances.- A statement made and signed by a person on appearance in response to any summons issued under section 70 during the course of any inquiry or proceedings under this Act shall be relevant, for the purpose of proving, in any prosecution for an offence under this Act, the truth of the facts which it contains,-
(a) when the person who made the statement is dead or cannot be found, or is incapable of giving evidence, or is kept out of the way by the adverse party, or whose presence cannot be obtained without an amount of delay or expense which, under the circumstances of the case, the court considers unreasonable; or
(b) when the person who made the statement is examined as a witness in the case before the court and the court is of the opinion that, having regard to the circumstances of the case, the statement should be admitted in evidence in the interest of justice.

What changed, and when

The amendment trail, newest first — because the version that applies to your case depends on the period.

2017-07-01 · Commenced

Provision as originally enacted in the CGST Act, 2017 (Act 12 of 2017) and brought into force w.e.f. 01-07-2017.

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Where this comes from

Text reproduced from the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs, as available on 2026-09-05. The explanation and practice notes above are GSTZone’s own, written for this hub. If you spot anything out of date, tell us and we’ll fix it — this hub is checked daily against CBIC.

section 136 cgstrelevancy of statements under certain circumstances

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