Exhaustion of alternate remedy required: taxpayers must respond to show cause notices and pursue statutory appeals if aggrieved.
An assessee must respond to a show cause notice and raise all grounds before the authority, and if aggrieved should avail the alternate statutory remedy of appeal; writ petitions against SCNs are ordinarily inappropriate unless there is a substantive violation of natural justice or a total lack of jurisdiction, and allegations of vagueness raised belatedly may be treated as attempts to circumvent statutory appeal/pre deposit requirements. (AI Summary)

Reverse charge on metal scrap and property renting imposes registration, invoice, and TDS obligations on recipients.
Notifications implement procedural and substantive GST changes: a waiver mechanism under Section 128A with prescribed forms and timelines; a special rectification process for prior orders denying input tax credit where credit is now available; extension of reverse charge to metal scrap and renting of non residential property by unregistered persons with related registration and 2% TDS on B2B metal scrap supplies; invoice and return time limits; and targeted rate changes including select pharmaceuticals and transport services. (AI Summary)

Return of loss filing: timely return required to carry forward business or capital losses; delay may be condoned under guidelines.
Section 139(3) requires timely filing of a return of loss to enable carry forward of business or capital losses; Section 80 bars carry forward of losses not determined by such a return, while unabsorbed depreciation under Section 32(2) is treated separately. The CBDT's Circular No. 09/2015 authorises delegated officers to condone delay subject to monetary limits, procedural conditions, a six year outer limit for applications, and specified safeguards including verification of correctness and absence of interest on belated refunds. (AI Summary)

Input Tax Credit misclassification: clerical misentries in GSTR-3B can be rectified via departmental rectification petitions.
Where ITC has been entered under the wrong tax head in Form GSTR-3B due to a clerical error (IGST entered as CGST/SGST), the taxpayer should file a petition for rectification and represent the mistake to the tax department so the department may consider the rectification and pass appropriate orders. (AI Summary)

Waiver of interest and penalty available when full tax demanded is paid and prescribed GST procedure is complied with.
Section 128A permits waiver of interest or penalty only where the taxpayer pays the full amount of tax demanded under a section 73 notice, statement or order and follows the procedure in Rule 164; partial payment is not permitted. The scheme requires submission of prescribed applications and payment within notified timelines, mandates deduction of amounts not payable under input tax credit rules before computing net tax payable, excludes interest on delayed return filing and certain other fees, and provides that failure to pay additional tax determined on appeal within three months voids the waiver. (AI Summary)

Possession of proceeds of crime can trigger PMLA liability, exposing trustees to prosecution and reversal of purportedly untainted assets.
The Prevention of Money Laundering Act treats proceeds of crime as property derived directly or indirectly from scheduled offences, and Section 3 penalises those who knowingly assist in or engage with such proceeds, including possession, acquisition, use or concealment. Where documentary and testimonial materials show trustees diverting member funds, collecting undocumented cash receipts, and enjoying assets traced to the trust, mere possession and enjoyment can constitute a sufficient nexus for PMLA invocation; the statutory burden of proof then shifts to the accused to rebut the allegations. (AI Summary)

Personal hearing required under tax determination procedure; failure to grant it mandates remand for a personal hearing before further action.
The court determined that an opportunity of hearing under the tax-determination procedure must be a personal hearing when requested or when an adverse decision is contemplated, reasoning that the omitted word was inadvertent and that statutory sections must be read together to avoid rendering provisions otiose; ambiguity is resolved in favour of the taxpayer and the court may supply a causus omissus. Where a personal hearing was requested but not granted, the matter must be remitted to the proper officer to grant that personal hearing before any further order is passed. (AI Summary)

Free Trade Warehousing Zones enable duty deferral for imports, facilitating storage, re-export, and DTA sales.
FTWZs, established within the SEZ framework, permit importers and traders to store, process, re export and sell goods without payment of customs duty or IGST until clearance to the Domestic Tariff Area, with DTA sales treated as imports and duty/GST payable on entry. FTWZ units enable value added activities, long storage tied to a Letter of Authorization, foreign currency settlement for cross zone and re export transactions, and masking of purchase value to DTA buyers. Customs Bonded Warehouses provide duty deferral until domestic clearance and duty waiver on export but have stricter limits on activities, storage period, and compliance obligations. (AI Summary)

Tax exclusion of extra neutral alcohol removes GST on ENA used to make potable liquor, shifting levy to states.
Legislative amendment excludes un-denatured Extra Neutral Alcohol (ENA) or rectified spirit when supplied for manufacture of alcoholic liquor for human consumption from the scope of GST, thereby placing the levy and collection of tax on such ENA within State taxation regimes; industrial ENA intended for non-potable uses remains subject to GST and separate HSN classification and rate treatment, while non-alcohol industries using ENA lose GST input tax credit on stocks treated as non-taxable. (AI Summary)

Insurance Ombudsman resolves consumer insurance disputes through mediation or binding awards enforceable against insurers.
The Rules create an Insurance Ombudsman system for cost effective resolution of personal and group insurance complaints; a Council issues guidelines and appoints Ombudsmen with prescribed qualifications and three year terms. The Ombudsman handles specified complaint types including claim delays, repudiation, premium disputes and misrepresentation, may mediate or, where mediation fails, issue a reasoned award within three months; awards are binding on insurers and must be complied with within thirty days, with interest for delayed payment. (AI Summary)

Non-recovery of GST where general trade practice prevailed allows waiver of tax recovery under the new provision.
Section 11A empowers the Government, on the recommendation of the Council, to notify that central tax need not be paid where a generally prevalent trade practice resulted in non-levy, short-levy, or lower levy of tax; it operates by a non-obstante clause to validate administrative regularisation of past practices and aims to prevent retrospective recovery arising from industry-wide interpretational uncertainties. (AI Summary)

TDS on metal scrap requires buyers to deduct tax at source, while RCM shifts GST liability to buyers.
Amendments establish RCM for metal scrap bought from unregistered suppliers, making registered buyers liable to pay GST and self invoice within the prescribed period, with the GST so paid eligible for Input Tax Credit. Separately, purchases from registered suppliers attract TDS requiring buyers to obtain a TDS registration, deduct tax at the notified rate when the contract value exceeds the threshold, file monthly TDS returns and issue certificates; deducted amounts are credited to the supplier's cash ledger for GST offset. (AI Summary)

Substitution of Resolution Applicant is barred after approval of a resolution plan; fresh invitation required if ineligible.
The article explains that substitution of a resolution applicant after CoC approval is precluded absent an RFRP provision permitting it: only persons listed as Prospective Resolution Applicants who filed EoIs and plans may be treated as implementing applicants. Equity infusion clauses do not authorise replacing the named applicant. Except for deleting non compliant provisions to satisfy Section 30(2), the CoC cannot modify an approved plan to substitute an entity that did not participate in the CIRP; where such substitution occurred the correct remedy is to reissue Form G and complete selection anew. (AI Summary)

Blocking of input tax credit limited to available electronic credit ledger balance under Rule 86A; excess blocking not permitted.
Rule 86A permits an officer to not allow debit from a taxpayer's electronic credit ledger only where there is credit available in that ledger which the officer reasonably believes has been fraudulently availed or is ineligible; the blocking must be limited to the portion of ITC actually available in the ledger at the time of the order and does not extend to credits already utilised or no longer present, with the measure operating as a temporary revenue protection mechanism subject to review and statutory temporal limits. (AI Summary)

GST interest and penalty waiver: pay outstanding tax by the notified deadline to obtain conditional waiver and conclude proceedings.
A statutory amnesty grants conditional waiver of interest and/or penalty where taxpayers facing specified GST demands pay the full tax due by the notified deadline and comply with prescribed procedural conditions. Eligible persons include those subject to show cause notices, adjudication orders or appellate orders for the covered periods, with exclusions for erroneous refund demands and unwithdrawn appeals or writs. A detailed rule prescribes application forms, timelines, officer actions, deemed conclusions, restoration mechanics for withdrawn appeals, and conditions that can void the waiver if additional payments required on re determination or appeal are not timely made. (AI Summary)

Power to arrest under GST law requires reason to believe and written authorization; safeguards and rights must be observed.
The Commissioner may authorize a Central Tax officer by written order to arrest a person only where there is reason to believe that an offence under section 132 has been committed; the standard is an objective assessment of relevant material. Arrests attract procedural safeguards: informing the arrested person of grounds, production before a magistrate within twenty-four hours, bail mechanisms for bailable offences by designated officers, and compliance with CrPC and constitutional rights. (AI Summary)

Ombudsman jurisdiction limited where civil proceedings are pending and complaints filed after a five year limitation are barred.
The Act empowers an Ombudsman to investigate allegations of corruption or maladministration and to order referrals, recoveries, or departmental action; Section 10 excludes matters subject to formal government or Commission inquiries, matters pending before a civil court, and complaints filed more than five years after the alleged occurrence. Where a civil suit over title was pending and the complaint was time barred, the Ombudsman lacked jurisdiction to direct actions affecting title or revenue records. (AI Summary)

Classification under aluminium household articles confirms aluminium foil containers attract lower GST rate, affecting departmental classification claims.
Aluminium foil containers were held to fall within the tariff entry for aluminium household articles and thus attract the lower GST rate; the High Court relied on prior Supreme Court aligned precedent, set aside the departmental classification to the higher rate for the assessment period in question, and directed refund of pre deposited amounts, citing relevant tariff entries and rate notifications. (AI Summary)

Classification of property under GST: excluding immovable subcategories risks incoherent goods vs services treatment.
Classification of 'property' under GST is problematic where statutes exclude an immovable sub category such as residential dwellings: the exclusion implies the governing category must be the broader class of properties rather than conflating distinct movable and immovable natures. The article argues immovable properties should be treated as services, not goods, and warns against using a generic notion of 'property' to encompass both goods and services under GST. (AI Summary)

Input Tax Credit rectification procedure enables taxpayers to correct wrongly availed ITC when now eligible under revised entitlement.
Notification No. 22/2024 provides a special rectification mechanism allowing taxpayers who were previously found to have wrongly availed Input Tax Credit to apply electronically, within a six month window, to have orders reviewed where the ITC is now claimable under revised entitlement provisions. Applicants must submit prescribed proforma details including order references, detailed ITC and tax particulars, and justification for current eligibility; the original tax officer must decide within three months, issue a rectified order if appropriate, update statutory forms, and afford natural justice where the rectification may adversely affect the taxpayer. (AI Summary)