Eligibility certificate cancellation cannot rest on later events after the certified period has already ended.

An eligibility certificate for a concluded earlier period cannot be cancelled on the basis of subsequent events occurring long after that period. The Tribunal treated later developments in July 1987 as legally irrelevant to a certificate granted for 16 March 1984 to 31 March 1984, and held that the cancellation orders could not stand. It also noted that the application concerned renewal of the certificate for later years under the relevant sales tax rules, but the earlier-period cancellation was the decisive issue and the other factual controversies were not examined.

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Issues: Whether an eligibility certificate granted for an earlier period could be cancelled on the basis of subsequent , and whether the impugned orders cancelling the certificate were liable to be set aside.

Analysis: The application was under section 8 of the West Bengal Taxation Tribunal Act, 1987 and also sought renewal of the eligibility certificate for later years under rule 3(66a) of the Bengal Sales Tax Rules, 1941. The decisive fact was that the certificate granted for the period from 16 March 1984 to 31 March 1984 had been cancelled on the basis of happenings in July 1987. Such later events could not legally furnish a basis for cancelling a certificate relating to an earlier and completed period. The Tribunal therefore found that the impugned orders could not stand, without entering into the other factual controversies raised by the parties.

Conclusion: The cancellation of the eligibility certificate for the March 1984 period was invalid and the impugned orders were set aside.

Ratio Decidendi: An eligibility certificate granted for a concluded earlier period cannot be cancelled on the basis of subsequent events occurring long after that period.

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