Gujarat High Court Flags Serious Concerns Over AI-Generated Fake Legal Citations

The Gujarat High Court said it is very concerning that some quasi-judicial authorities are using Artificial Intelligence (AI) to create legal case citations that either don’t exist or are not relevant to the case they are deciding.

This issue came up during a hearing about an order passed by the Additional Commissioner of Central GST and Central Excise. The court said the order was flawed and misleading because it relied on case laws that were not properly checked.

The case was filed by Marhabba Overseas Private Limited through its lawyer, challenging the Commissioner’s order. It was pointed out that the Commissioner seemed to depend on AI-generated case references without actually reading the real judgements. Some of the cited cases did not exist, and others had nothing to do with the matter being argued.

The bench, consisting of Justice A. S. Supehia and Justice Pranav Trivedi, said there should be clear guidelines for quasi-judicial authorities. They stressed that officials should not blindly rely on AI-generated judgements, especially when those judgements are fake or unrelated to the case.

The judges also said the Commissioner’s reasoning was deceptive because it appeared the officer followed AI-generated citations without checking the actual court decisions.

The court further noted that rules should be made to guide such authorities when they rely on judgments from High Courts or the Supreme Court of India while deciding cases involving taxpayers.