Chargesheet without sanction: Is it incomplete? Supreme Court says no.

The police filed the chargesheet on time. But it was missing one key document—the prosecution's sanction. The accused said: that's not a valid chargesheet. Five men, arrested with hand grenades and mobile phones, sat in jail watching the 180-day clock tick toward a legal escape hatch—only to find the Supreme Court slam it shut.

Could a chargesheet without a government sign-off really be called a chargesheet at all? The answer, the Court said, depends on what a chargesheet is supposed to do. And that question—whether a missing sanction makes an investigation incomplete—would determine whether five accused men walked free on default bail (the right to bail when police fail to complete investigation within the statutory period).

When the bag hit the ground

It began on a June evening in 2019. Punjab police, patrolling near Amritsar, spotted two men on a motorcycle with no number plate. The men fled. In their haste, they dropped a bag. Inside: a mobile phone and two hand grenades. The bag hit the asphalt. The contents spilled. The police moved in.

An FIR (a written complaint that starts a police investigation) was registered at Police Station Raja Sansi on June 2, 2019. Over the following months, five accused were arrested—each picked up, questioned, and placed in custody as the investigation widened. The investigation stretched beyond the standard 90-day limit for filing a chargesheet. The Additional Sessions Judge, Amritsar, granted an extension to 180 days on September 17, 2019—a procedural step that bought the police more time to build their case.

On November 15, 2019—within that extended period—the police filed the chargesheet before the SDJM, Ajnala. The document ran to many pages. It included the mobile phone data, the grenade seizure memos, witness statements, forensic reports. The file had weight. But one thing was missing: the prosecution sanction required under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and the Explosive Substances Act.

Ten days later, on November 25, the case was committed to the Court of Sessions under Section 209 of the CrPC (the committal procedure that transfers a case from a Magistrate to a Sessions Court). Then, on February 22, 2020, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) took over the case from New Delhi, re-registering it as an NIA investigation. The procedural machinery had shifted gears.

The missing signature

Under Section 45(1) of the UAPA, no court can take cognizance (formally notice and proceed with a case) unless the central or state government has granted sanction for prosecution. Similarly, the Explosive Substances Act requires sanction before a court can proceed. The chargesheet had been filed, but the government had not yet signed off. The document sat in the court file, complete in every other respect—but without that one crucial authorisation.

The accused saw an opening. They applied for default bail under Section 167(2) of the CrPC (the provision that gives an accused the right to bail if the police fail to complete the investigation within the prescribed time). Their argument: a chargesheet without sanction is not a valid chargesheet. It is incomplete. Therefore, the investigation was not complete. Therefore, the 180-day clock had expired. Therefore, they were entitled to default bail as a matter of right.

The Special Court in Mohali rejected the application on December 17, 2020. The Punjab and Haryana High Court dismissed the appeal on April 26, 2022. The accused came to the Supreme Court, their last hope resting on a single procedural point.

What the accused argued

The appellants—charged under the Indian Penal Code for criminal conspiracy (Section 120B), under the UAPA for terrorist acts and membership of a terrorist gang (Sections 17, 18, 18B, 20), and under the Explosive Substances Act for possession and use of explosives (Sections 4 and 5)—pressed a single point: the chargesheet was a shell without the sanction. It could not be treated as a final report under Section 173(2) CrPC (the police officer's report on completion of investigation). Until the sanction came, the investigation was still open, they argued. The police could still be gathering evidence. The clock should keep running.

The National Investigation Agency (NIA), which had taken over the case in February 2020, countered: the chargesheet contained all documents the prosecution intended to rely upon. The sanction was a separate requirement for the court to take cognizance—not for the police to complete the investigation. The two stages, they said, were distinct. One did not depend on the other. The investigation was done. The sanction was a formality for the next phase.

Why the Supreme Court said no

The bench—Chief Justice Dr. Dhananjaya Y. Chandrachud and Justice J.B. Pardiwala—dismissed the appeals on May 1, 2023. The reasoning turned on a careful separation of two legal moments: the completion of investigation and the taking of cognizance.

Section 167(2) CrPC, the Court held, is concerned only with the first moment. Once a final report under Section 173(2) is filed—with all documents on which the prosecution proposes to rely—the investigation is complete for the purposes of that provision. The grant of sanction is "nowhere contemplated" under Section 167. It is relevant only at the cognizance stage, which comes later. The Court drew a bright line: the police investigate and file; the court examines and sanctions. They are separate acts in separate chapters of the procedural code.

The Court cited its own precedents. In Sanjay Dutt v. State, it had held that default bail is a right that accrues only if the investigation remains incomplete at the end of the prescribed period. In Uday Mohanlal Acharya v. State of Maharashtra, it had clarified that the right is enforceable the moment the period expires without a chargesheet. But here, the chargesheet had been filed within time. The missing sanction did not change that fact. The precedents cut against the accused, not in their favour.

The Court also rejected a secondary argument: that the chargesheet had been filed before the wrong court (a Magistrate's court instead of the Special Court under the NIA Act). This error, the Court said, did not entitle the accused to default bail. Committal proceedings (the process of sending a case from a Magistrate to a Sessions Court) are not required for NIA prosecutions under the UAPA, by virtue of Section 16 of the NIA Act (which gives Special Courts direct jurisdiction over such cases). The procedural misstep was irrelevant to the default bail question.

The right that never came

There was one more twist. The accused had applied for default bail only in December 2020—more than a year after the chargesheet was filed. The Court noted that even if the right had accrued at some point (which it had not), the accused had failed to apply when it arose. In Rakesh Kumar Paul v. State of Assam, the Court had held that the default bail right continues to be enforceable only if the accused applies when the right accrues. If the accused waits and a chargesheet is filed in the meantime, the right is extinguished. The clock does not pause for indecision.

The appeals were dismissed. The five men remained in custody. The case—Judgebir Singh @ Jasbir Singh Samra & Ors. v. National Investigation Agency—was closed.

What this means for practitioners

The judgment draws a clean line between investigation and prosecution. A chargesheet is a statement that the police have gathered what they need. The sanction is a statement that the government is ready to proceed. They are separate acts, governed by separate provisions, and a delay in one does not infect the other. The ratio decidendi (the binding principle of the decision) is clear: filing of chargesheet completes investigation for Section 167 purposes regardless of sanction.

For defence lawyers, the lesson is procedural: default bail arguments must focus on the completeness of the investigation, not the completeness of the prosecution's paperwork. Challenging the absence of sanction belongs at the cognizance stage, not the bail stage. For prosecutors, the judgment offers reassurance: a timely chargesheet, even without sanction, blocks the default bail clock. The right to default bail is extinguished the moment the final report lands on the court's file.

The Court also clarified that the error of filing before a Magistrate instead of a Special Court does not revive the default bail right. Section 16 of the NIA Act overrides the ordinary committal procedure. Practitioners must know which court has jurisdiction before they file—but a mistake in forum does not undo the fact that the investigation is complete.

THE PLAY: File the chargesheet with all documents the prosecution intends to rely upon within the statutory period—sanction can follow at the cognizance stage.

THE TEST: Is the investigation complete under Section 173(2)? If yes, the default bail clock stops—regardless of whether sanction has been obtained.

WHAT THIS MEANS: Sanction is a cognizance-stage requirement, not an investigation-stage requirement. The two are procedurally distinct, and a missing sanction does not entitle an accused to default bail.

The bag with the grenades had been dropped on a road near Amritsar. The legal question dropped at the Supreme Court's door. Both landed in the same place: on the ground, not in the air. The Court's answer was firm: a chargesheet without sanction is still a chargesheet. The investigation was complete. The default bail door stayed shut.