The Honourable Madras High Court has straightforwardly directed the Goods and Services Tax Department to initiate action against those officials who are causing loss of revenue to the State Exchequer.
Recently Shri GE Govindaraj, the petitioner had been seeking quashing of a 2012 notice of the Assistant Commissioner in the Arisipalayam Assessment Circle that is located in Salem District. The notice has sought to recover the sales tax arrears for 2000-01 and 2001-02.
The Counsel for the petitioner, Mr S Rajasekar, mentioned that the petitioner has been the bonafide buyer and had bought the property in the year 2006. Thereafter the impugned notice had been issued after a gap of nearly 11 years for the purpose of collecting sales tax arrears due and 6 years after the buying of the subject property by the petitioner.
Shri P.Nanmaran who appeared on behalf of the respondent had made a submission that from the year 2006 afterwards, several letters had been sent to the second respondent; however, there was a lack of apt response from the side of the second respondent. Ultimately, the respondent had initiated action as per the Revenue Recovery Act and further issued a notice that directed the petitioner to pay the arrears in the sales tax within a period of 7 days. If failed in complying with the aforesaid direction then the property of the petitioner shall be attached as per the provisions of ‘Tamil Nadu General Sales Tax Act, 1959’.
The Single Judge Bench of the Justice SM Subramaniam passed a ruling that if misconduct or otherwise is found on the part of the officials, then further actions had to be taken to recover the loss of the state exchequer from the said officials.
The court has directed the tax department to issue apt orders to all the subordinate officers to identify the cases wherein no action has been taken against the officials who have not collected the arrears of the tax in the past. The court also directed the officers to take apt action against those officers who are guilty of the aforesaid conduct.
The court said that Being the custodian of the constitution, it is the duty of the high court to make sure that the principles of the constitution are shielded for the benefit of the citizens of the country.
“The two authorities shall coordinate with the Department of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption by conducting frequent surprise raids to control the evil menace of corrupt activities of demand and acceptance of bribes or receipt of freebies from the business community across the State, the court added.”
