The Kerala GST Department has provided guidelines via instruction no.6/2025 for the Amnesty Scheme’s implementation under Section 128A of the KSGST Act, which addresses the exemption of interest, penalties, or both concerning demands made under Section 73 of the KGST Act for the fiscal years 2017–18, 2018–19, and 2019–20.
To ease the GST Act about Financial Years 2017-18, 2018-19, and 2019-20, subject to certain conditions, The 53rd meeting of the GST Council is been suggested.
On the grounds of the councils’ suggestion to draw the provision of these exemptions, amendments have been brought in the KSGST Act 2017 and inserted Section 128A with effect from 01.11.2024. In Rule 164 of the KGST Rules, 2017 the procedures for availing the benefit of the scheme and the process flow by the proper officer have been defined.
Any eligible individual who wishes to claim the scheme to take advantage would be needed to make the payment of the tax demanded u/s 73 of the GST Act and submit an application in Form GST SPL- 01 in the common portal in case where the adjudication is pending.
If the case is that the demand order has been issued to take benefits of the scheme then the application would be mandated to get filed in FORM GST SPL-02, after crediting the tax amount in the electronic liability register against the debit entry produced by the said order.
According to sub-rule (2B) of Rule 142, taxpayers must first file an application in FORM GST DRC-03A if payments have already been made in DRC-03 against a demand order. To offset the payments made via FORM GST DRC-03 against the outstanding demand in the electronic liability ledger, this must be completed before filing FORM GST SPL-02.
Under the provisions of the Act, the applications submitted in FORM GST SPL-01 and in FORM GST SPL-02 shall need to be verified and processed via the proper officer within the time limit prescribed in the statute.
Field formations raised doubts and asked for clarification on the processing of the application received. To ease the procedure and to ensure uniformity in the field formation, in applying the provided authority u/s 168 of the act, the instructions are been issued for stringent compliance.
In such a way the Model-2 back office system is designed so that the applications furnished u/s 128A of the said act in FORM GST SPL-01, will be assigned, to the officers already managing such ARN, Case ID, or Demand ID, ie. in the seat were such adjudication is pending.
By this time limit for adjudicating orders u/s 73 of the Act for financial years up to the financial year 2019-20, has already been exhausted, and these applications are not anticipated to appear.
For cases where demand orders have been issued before and the taxpayer has not filed any statutory appeals within the specified time limit, such cases are now grown for recovery u/s 97 of the Act and have been allocated to the Recovery Cell for additional action.
For the amnesty applications filed against such orders, the system will allocate such applications filed to the officers in the Recovery Cell to settle the demand of interest and penalty.
As, these applications require detailed verification of payments, documents associated with the demand, and demands to be settled as per the provisions of sub-sections (5) and (6) of section 16, it will not be suitable to process such cases in the Recovery Cell.
Therefore, the Deputy Commissioners/Assistant Commissioner/State Tax Officers in the Recovery Cell are directed to re-assign such applications (FORM GST SPL – 02) to the related taxpayer Service Circle for processing such applications.
Service Circle for Application Processing
In the taxpayer service vertical the proper officer will process the applications obtained u/s 128A of the GST act along with those applications obtained after such re-assignment in the manner as defined in Rule 164 of the KGST Rules, complying with the financial limit instruction issued under the Circular No. 05/2023 dated 08.01.2023 issued by the State GST Department.
State GST Authority
The State Back Office admin or the District Back Office admin shall provide significant guidance or support to the officers in the recovery cell for re-assigning these cases to the proper officers in the taxpayer service vertical.
