Kerala HC: GST Section 107 Manages Inbuilt Mechanism and Exempts Limitation Act from Application

Section 107 of the CGST Act would be the inbuilt procedure and would exclude the application of the limitation act, the Kerala High Court ruled.

The act of limitation shall be subjected to be applied merely when the same would get extended to a certain law, the bench of Justice C.S Dias witnessed. The provisions of the financial law would be required to be construed and interpreted and are thus rudimentary.

The taxpayer is a company who have been involved in direct marketing. The applicant would secure the GST registration. The business of the applicant would get affected due to the covid-19 pandemic and thus it loses from return filing for the said time. GST registration would get cancelled by the respondents. Despite the applicant’s wishes to appeal to the Additional Commissioner Headquarters (Appeals). Based on the delay the petition was dismissed.

The applicant contended that the same was merely because of the covid-19 pandemic which he was losing to file the return on the specified time. The respondent perfunctorily dismissed the appeal of the applicant.

The department opposed that by virtue of Section 29(2)(c) of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2007, the proper officer would have the authority to dismiss the registration of GST when the registered individual does not furnish the returns for the successive duration as stated, which was 6 months at that time. When the person does not get satisfied with the cancellation process then his remedy would be to furnish a petition under section 107. But the petitioner would be obligated to get filed in the state duration stated under section 107(4) i.e. 3 or 6 months with the additional duration of 1 month. The appeal furnished by the petition after the said duration could merely be rejected in the time-lapse.

The Central Goods and Services Tax Act is a unique act and a self-contained code, according to the court’s ruling. The respondent’s decision to reject the appeal as time-barred was not unlawful.