A writ petition filed by M/s Diwakar Road Lines challenging the rejection of an application to compound all previous service tax by way of a one-time settlement has been dismissed by a division bench of the Andhra Pradesh High Court.
It was carried by the bench that even though the regulatory does not specify the rejection of any application, the committee may reject an application when the documents laid on are ingenuine.
While passing the order, The Division Bench comprised of Justice R. Raghunandan Rao and Justice Harinath. N differentiated from an order passed by the Karnataka High Court, carrying that not permitting rejection of application when the documents themselves are ingenue would consequence in an ‘extreme situation.’
“In the present case, the Designated Committee hadset out the reasons for rejection as filing of bogus certificates and notices. This Court is of the opinion that, where applications had been filed by producing documents which are not genuine, the same can be rejected by the Designated Committee. Any other view would mean that a person claiming the benefit of the scheme can come forward with any kind of document and the Designated Committee is precluded from going into the question of whether the said document is genuine or not. Such a view would result in extreme situations.”
Under the applicant’s claim (a contract carriage of air-conditioned buses and non-air conditioned busses) the tax dept issued her a notice in 2016 to file the service tax on the operation of air-conditioned buses. An application has been made by her under the scheme ‘Sabkha Vishwas (Legacy Dispute Resolution) Scheme 2019, under which, provisions were made to compound tax under various Acts.
She mentioned that her application was rejected and contesting it the present writ was furnished.
The respondent’s counsel claimed that the notice does not reveal the amount liable to get paid and that it was by a person who was not competent and did not have the jurisdiction.
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It was claimed that the notice must ideally have been furnished via the Superintendent or the Jurisdictional Assistant Commissioner (JAC), however, it was issued by the Superintendent of Central Tax.
It was too carried to the notice of the court that the amounts revealed via the applicant before varied authorities do not tally. That no entry was therein the outward register for the notice, therefore it can be concluded that it was issued out of the normal course.
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The applicant laid on Jagadish Advertising Vs. Designated Committee, (Karnataka) claiming that the committee had no authorisation to reject any application.
The bench can not accept the same explanation since the documents laid upon were themselves under challenge. Therefore the writ was dismissed.
| Case Title | M/s Diwakar Road Lines vs. The Union Of India and Others |
| Citation | WRIT PETITION NO: 19920/2020 |
| Date | 21.02.2025 |
| For the Petitioner | Harish Kumar Rasineni |
| For the Respondents | Nagaraju Naguru, Dilip Jayaram S, Y N Vivekananda |
| Andhra Pradesh High Court | Read Order |
