Kerala HC: GST Order Issued U/S 73 Must Include Digital or Manual Signature of the Officer to Be Valid

The Kerala High Court mentioned that orders furnished u/s 73 of the CGST/SGST Acts should carry the digital or manual signature of the officer passing the order to treat the order to be a valid order.

The Bench of Justice Gopinath P. was regarding the problem of whether the issued orders under section 73 of the CGST/SGST acts should have the digital or manual signature of the officer passing the order to treat the order to be a valid order for the CGST/SGST Acts.

In this matter, the writ petition was submitted via the taxpayer citing that the order issued u/s 73 of the CGST is not valid as they do not have the digital/manual signature of the officer passing the order.

The bench examined the matter of Silver Oak Villas LLP V. Assistant Commissioner (ST), Begunpet Division Hyderabad [(2024) 17 Centax 442 (Telangana)], where it was mentioned that

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“8. Yet another matter came up before the High Court of Delhi in W.P.No.2872 of 2023, which stood decided on 03.02.2023 [2023 (78) G.S.T.L. 232(Del.) =(2023) 7 Centax 174 (Del.)], wherein in paragraph Nos.14 to 17 the High Court of Delhi has held as under:

Concededly, the impugned order cannot be sustained as it is unsigned. This issue is covered by the decision of a coordinate Bench of this Court in Railsys Engineers Private Limited & Anr. V. The Additional Commissioner of Central Goods and Services Tax (Appeals-II) & Anr. W.P.(C) 4712/2022, decided on 21.07.2022.:

An unsigned notice or an order cannot be considered an order as has been held by the Bombay High Court in Ramani Suchit Malushte vs. Union of India and ors. W.P.(C) 9331/2022, decided on 21.09.2022. Given the above, the impugned order dated 07.06.2022 is set aside.”

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Post-examining the matter of Silver Oak Villas (supra) the bench viewed that the reference to Rule 26(3) of the CGST Rules in the expressed judgment may not be appropriate as that Rule refers especially to registration problems.

The bench mentioned that “…it will be open to the competent among the respondents/department in all these cases to upload fresh orders by affixing digital signatures or by serving a copy of the order after affixing a manual signature.”

The bench in the aforesaid view has permitted the petition and set aside the impugned order.