Continued from Part 1
18. The remaining issue concerns 4,31,646 rupees that the appellant allegedly underpaid in 2015-16 compared to what they reported in their own ST-3 returns. The appellant claims they actually paid 4,89,669 rupees in 2017-18 that should cover this debt, and they provided challans as proof. The commissioner noted that while challans prove money was paid to the government, they do not automatically prove which specific tax debt they were meant to cover. To credit a 2017 payment against a 2015 debt, a formal reconciliation between the payment receipts and the tax returns is required. To ensure fairness, the matter is sent back to the original tax office to perform this reconciliation. If the verification shows that tax is still owed, the appellant must pay the remaining amount plus interest for the delay. Additionally, a penalty under Section 78 will be applied to any amount that remains unpaid after this review.
Final Order:
1. Demand made in respect of the receipts from M/s UPPCL and M/s Krishi Utpadan Mandi Samiti is barred by limitation.
2. Demand of Rs.24,528/- for the period 2014-15 made towards “Material Cost for provisions of Taxable Services (Amount claimed as supply of goods without any evidence) is upheld.
3. Demand of service tax short paid vis-a-vis admitted liability as per ST-3 return during the period 2015-16 along with the interest is upheld, but the same need to be adjusted against the payments claimed to be made by the appellants against challans to be submitted by them to adjudicating authority. For proper verification of challans and their reconciliation with the ST-3 returns of the appellant matter is remanded back to the Original Authority.
4. Penalty to the extent of un-reconciled amount under Section 78 of Finance Act, 1994 is also upheld.
5. Penalties under Section 77 (1) (b) and 77 (1) (c) are set aside.
6. Appeal is partially allowed as indicated in para 4.8 above and matter remanded to original authority.
7. As matter is quite old to be decided by the original authority in remand proceedings within three months of the date of receipt of this order.
Suggestions for better taxation:
Although a huge amount of nearly 1.1 crore of GST was dropped by the Additional Commissioner, Appellant approached the Tribunal to drop the remaining tax, penalties, interest etc. Such things are occurring only due to cash payment and huge income tax burden on common citizen. If Government wants everyone to pay tax, then income tax may be reduced and taxes on purchase of goods and service shall be recovered completely. Also an incentive for online payment shall be given in the form of discount/rebate so that people will opt online or bank payment for every single purchase.
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This is not a legal advice. This article is based on the judgment and order of the Court.