The SFIO has filed a prosecution complaint against your company and its directors for alleged violations of the Companies Act. The CBI has registered an FIR naming you in a bank fraud investigation. The Economic Offences Wing has arrested your business partner and is looking for you. The Enforcement Directorate has searched your home and office and seized documents, devices, and cash. Or your company has discovered that its CFO has been systematically defrauding the organisation for three years — and you need to investigate, contain the damage, preserve your legal position, and decide whether to report to regulators, all within days. Each of these situations demands immediate, expert, coordinated legal action. Not eventually. Now.
Goldschmidt Pallonji's Fraud & White Collar practice is built around two capabilities that most Indian firms treat as separate — criminal defence and forensic accounting. Our advocates have appeared before the CBI Special Courts, Sessions Courts, High Courts, and the Supreme Court in criminal matters. Our in-house forensic accounting team has conducted internal investigations, asset tracing assignments, and financial statement forensic reviews. When fraud strikes — whether you are the target of an investigation or the victim of one — GP can respond across both dimensions simultaneously, from the first hour.
Our practice covers the full spectrum of white-collar crime — corporate fraud, bank fraud, securities fraud, tax evasion, criminal breach of trust, forgery, cheating, FEMA violations, Companies Act contraventions, SEBI violations, and the predicate offence dimensions that generate PMLA exposure. We defend individuals and companies. We conduct internal investigations for companies who are victims. We advise boards and audit committees on disclosure obligations. And we coordinate across the multiple proceedings — criminal, regulatory, civil recovery — that every significant fraud generates simultaneously.
Criminal defence, corporate investigations, regulatory enforcement response, and financial crime across all agencies and forums.
Personal criminal defence for company directors, promoters, executives, and high-net-worth individuals facing FIRs, arrest, custody, bail applications, charge sheet, trial, and appeal across fraud, cheating, criminal breach of trust, forgery, PMLA, FEMA, and Companies Act offences before all courts across India.
Learn More →Defence of companies facing prosecution under Companies Act (SFIO/ROC), SEBI Act, PMLA, FEMA, Prevention of Corruption Act, and IPC/BNS. Coordination across multiple simultaneous proceedings — criminal, regulatory, civil, and PMLA attachment — with a single unified defence strategy.
Learn More →Confidential internal investigations for boards, audit committees, and shareholders who have discovered or suspect fraud, embezzlement, bribery, or misconduct within their organisation. Our forensic accountants and lawyers work together — document review, financial transaction analysis, witness interviews, digital forensics, and investigation report with legal privilege protection.
Learn More →Tracing of diverted assets through multiple entities, bank accounts, and jurisdictions. Applications for injunctions, freezing orders, and receiver appointments. Cross-border asset recovery in Australia, Singapore, UAE, Hong Kong, and the UK. Our forensic accountants prepare the financial evidence trail that courts and regulators require for asset tracing relief.
Learn More →Response to show cause notices, inquiry proceedings, and enforcement orders from SEBI, RBI, ROC, MCA, and Income Tax Investigation Wing. Representation before adjudicating officers, appellate tribunals (SAT, ITAT), and High Courts. Coordination with criminal proceedings where the regulatory matter generates parallel criminal liability.
Learn More →Defence and victim representation in cyber fraud matters — online banking fraud, phishing, identity theft, business email compromise, crypto fraud, and UPI payment fraud. Digital forensic evidence analysis, FIR filing strategy, Section 66C/66D IT Act proceedings, and cross-border recovery where fraud proceeds have been transferred internationally.
Learn More →Every significant fraud generates at least three simultaneous proceedings — a criminal FIR, an ED PMLA attachment, and a regulatory enforcement action. Most defence lawyers handle only one stream. GP handles all three with a unified strategy, which means statements made in one proceeding do not inadvertently damage your position in another. This coordination is the single most important thing a defence team does in the first three months of a complex white-collar matter.
If your company has been defrauded — by a director, employee, business partner, or third party — GP provides end-to-end victim representation: internal investigation to establish the facts, FIR filing strategy to maximise recovery, civil suit for damages, and coordination with regulators where the fraud has regulatory dimensions. Our forensic accountants quantify the loss and trace the assets. Our lawyers pursue them.
If you know you are under investigation — even if no formal summons has been issued — the window for proactive action is open only briefly. Documents can be preserved or reviewed. Witnesses can be prepared. The defence narrative can be constructed before the prosecution's version becomes established. GP provides a confidential pre-investigation review — an assessment of your exposure, your defences, and what you should do now — under full attorney-client privilege.
Economic crime prosecution is built on financial evidence — account statements, transaction records, company books, and forensic analysis. The best criminal defence of a fraud allegation requires forensic accounting capability alongside legal strategy. GP has both in-house. When investigators build a financial narrative against you, GP can dismantle it with equal professional rigour — not with legal argument alone.
White-collar matters generate criminal, PMLA, regulatory, and civil proceedings simultaneously. Most firms assign different lawyers to each stream. This creates risk — a statement made in one proceeding can become evidence in another. GP manages all streams with a single, coordinated strategy, so that every statement, every submission, and every document produced is consistent across all forums and does not create inadvertent self-incrimination.
Modern economic crime does not respect borders. When an Indian fraud investigation leads to an MLAT request to Australia, a freezing order in Singapore, or an OFAC sanctions issue in the UAE, GP's international corridors allow the defence to respond across jurisdictions simultaneously. Our team has the networks and qualifications to coordinate defence strategy in all five of our international corridor jurisdictions.
Complete confidentiality maintained. These matters illustrate the nature of our fraud and white-collar practice.
Defended a manufacturing company's MD facing simultaneous SFIO prosecution complaint (Companies Act Section 447) and ED provisional attachment of personal and corporate assets. GP's forensic accountants prepared counter-analysis to SFIO's financial findings. PMLA attachment partially vacated. SFIO prosecution defended at trial stage with acquittal on key charges.
Conducted an independent internal investigation for an ASX-listed company's Indian subsidiary following whistleblower allegations against the CFO. GP's forensic accountants identified ₹45Cr in systematic diversion over three years. Investigation report prepared under legal privilege. CBI FIR filed, civil recovery suit initiated, and SEBI disclosure managed simultaneously.
Represented members of a promoter family in a CBI case involving alleged bank fraud in excess of ₹200Cr across multiple PSU lenders. Obtained anticipatory bail for the principal accused. Discharge applications filed before the Special CBI Court. GP's forensic analysis of the loan documentation and drawdown utilisation formed the core of the defence submission.
The practice is led by advocates with courtroom experience before CBI Special Courts, Sessions Courts, and High Courts in criminal matters, working alongside forensic accountants who have conducted investigation assignments, prepared expert witness reports, and built financial evidence for litigation. This combination — rare in Indian legal practice — is what makes GP capable of defending economic crime at the level of sophistication that regulators and prosecutors bring to their cases.
The SFIO's expanding use of Section 447 Companies Act fraud provisions against directors — personal liability exposure, bail jurisprudence, and defence strategy.
Read Bulletin →ED, CBI, SFIO, and EOW enforcement statistics for 2025 — attachment values, prosecution rates, conviction trends, and what they mean for directors and promoters in 2026.
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