Mandatory service requirements under tax rules prevent limitation from running where substituted service is not properly effected.

Mandatory service under rule 44 of the Bihar Sales Tax Rules required personal delivery, tender to an authorised recipient, or post, and substituted service by affixation was permissible only after those methods failed and the authority directed affixation. The text states that mere attempted service on the assessee and his pleader, without compliance with those preconditions, was insufficient to constitute valid service. As a result, the forty-five-day limitation period under section 24(2) of the Bihar Sales Tax Act did not commence from the alleged service, and the finding of limitation was held erroneous.

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Issues: Whether notice of the assessment order was served in accordance with rule 44 of the Bihar Sales Tax Rules, 1949, and whether the appeals were barred by limitation under section 24(2) of the Bihar Sales Tax Act, 1947.

Analysis: The notices were required to be served in the manner prescribed by rule 44, which permitted personal delivery, tender to an authorised recipient, service by post, and, only where those methods failed and the Sales Tax Authority was satisfied that the addressee was avoiding service or the notice could not otherwise be served, service by affixation on a conspicuous part of the office, residence, or last notified place of business. The record showed only an attempted service on the assessee and his pleader, without compliance with the mandatory procedural safeguard requiring the Sales Tax Authority's direction for affixation after failed service. In these circumstances, the service could not be treated as valid, and the statutory period of forty-five days under section 24(2) did not begin to run from the alleged service.

Conclusion: The notice was not validly served under rule 44, and the appeals were not time-barred under section 24(2); the finding of limitation was erroneous and the appeals ought to have been heard on merits.

Final Conclusion: The reference was answered in favour of the assessee, holding that the service of notice was invalid and that the appeals were within time.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a statute prescribes a mandatory mode of service and permits substituted service only upon compliance with the conditions precedent laid down in the rules, non-compliance with those conditions prevents valid service and postpones the commencement of limitation.

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