Issues: Whether the extended period of limitation could be invoked for the excise-duty demand where the relevant facts and records had been made available during audit.

Analysis: The demand covered April 2011 to November 2013, while the audit had issued a deficiency memo on 10.03.2014 based on the assessee's records. The show-cause notice was issued only on 13.04.2016 by invoking the extended period. Availability of the material records to audit did not establish suppression or any conduct justifying invocation of the extended limitation period.

Conclusion: The extended period of limitation was not invocable; the demand raised by its invocation was time-barred and was set aside in favour of the assessee.

Issues: (i) Whether the additional input tax credit benefit was fully passed on to eligible homebuyers; (ii) whether free additional construction work could substitute commensurate reduction in prices; (iii) whether interest was payable on the unpassed benefit; and (iv) whether penalty was attracted for the contravention.

Issue (i): Whether the additional input tax credit benefit was fully passed on to eligible homebuyers.

Analysis: Section 171(1) requires the benefit of additional input tax credit to reach each recipient through a commensurate reduction in price. The supplementary verification accepted that the benefit had been passed to four homebuyers, but determined a remaining differential amount of Rs. 99,435 for two homebuyers. The revised computation and supporting material disclosed no factual or legal infirmity.

Conclusion: The Respondent failed to pass on Rs. 99,435 of the additional input tax credit benefit to the concerned homebuyers, contrary to Section 171(1), in favour of Revenue.

Issue (ii): Whether free additional construction work could substitute commensurate reduction in prices.

Analysis: The statutory mode of passing on tax or input tax credit benefit is commensurate reduction in price. An equivalent commercial advantage, including free additional construction work, does not fulfil that prescribed mode even where its asserted value exceeds the differential benefit.

Conclusion: Free additional construction work is not valid compliance with the obligation to pass on input tax credit benefit through commensurate reduction in prices, in favour of Revenue.

Issue (iii): Whether interest was payable on the unpassed benefit.

Analysis: Rule 133(3)(b) mandates interest where an amount has not been passed on by commensurate reduction in prices. The affected recipients were deprived of the monetary benefit from the dates on which the higher amounts were collected.

Conclusion: Interest at 18% per annum is payable on the differential profiteered amount from collection of the higher amount until actual payment, in favour of Revenue.

Issue (iv): Whether penalty was attracted for the contravention.

Analysis: The contravention continued after Section 171(3A) came into force on 01.01.2020. The statutory proviso preserves the consequence that no penalty is leviable if the profiteered amount is deposited within thirty days of the order.

Conclusion: The Respondent is liable to penalty under Section 171(3A), in favour of Revenue.

Final Conclusion: The remaining input tax credit benefit must be passed to the affected recipients with statutory interest, and the contravention attracts the applicable anti-profiteering penalty regime.

Ratio Decidendi: The benefit of additional input tax credit under Section 171 must be transmitted to each recipient by commensurate reduction in price and cannot be replaced by in-kind or other commercial benefits.

Issues: (i) Whether the Inland Container Depot is a public place under the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988; (ii) Whether a Reach Stacker used within the Inland Container Depot is a motor vehicle under the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988.

Issue (i): Whether the Inland Container Depot is a public place under the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988.

Analysis: A public place requires a right of access vested in the public. The Inland Container Depot is a customs bonded area where ingress and egress are controlled and access is confined to duly authorised persons. Its specially designed internal roads, used for movement of heavy machinery and containers, are not places to which members of the public can claim entry as of right.

Conclusion: The Inland Container Depot and its internal roads are not a public place under the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988. This conclusion is against the claimant.

Issue (ii): Whether a Reach Stacker used within the Inland Container Depot is a motor vehicle under the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988.

Analysis: The requirement that a mechanically propelled vehicle be adapted for use upon roads entails its suitability and dominant utility for ordinary roads. The Reach Stacker substantially exceeds prescribed road-weight limits, is transported in dismantled form, lacks ordinary road-safety features, and operates on specially reinforced internal roads for limited container-handling functions. Though wheeled and mechanically propelled, it is a special-purpose vehicle adapted only for use in enclosed premises and falls within the statutory exclusion. Its non-registration is consistent with this classification, since registration is required only for a motor vehicle.

Conclusion: A Reach Stacker of this nature is excluded from the definition of motor vehicle under the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988. This conclusion is in favour of the appellant.

Final Conclusion: The compensation claim under the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 cannot be maintained in respect of the accident involving the Reach Stacker within the restricted Inland Container Depot; the clarification preserves claims involving regular road-going vehicles entering that area.

Ratio Decidendi: A special-purpose mechanically propelled vehicle whose dominant use is confined to enclosed premises and which is not suitable for ordinary public roads is excluded from the statutory definition of a motor vehicle, notwithstanding its wheels and mechanical propulsion.

Issues: Whether a person required to furnish information in an ongoing SFIO investigation has an enforceable right at the preliminary stage to obtain the Central Government's investigation orders and the material underlying those orders.

Analysis: The notice under Section 217 disclosed that the information was sought in connection with an investigation into identified companies and because of the petitioner's financial transactions with them, and specified the categories of records required. The investigation was ongoing, involved multiple entities, and the investigation orders and underlying material contained sensitive information. Disclosure at that stage could prejudice the wider investigation and connected proceedings. No prejudicial action against the petitioner had yet reached a stage warranting disclosure or invocation of remedies based on natural justice.

Conclusion: The petitioner had no enforceable right to disclosure of the investigation orders or underlying material at the preliminary stage; it may pursue remedies available in law if prejudicial action is taken subsequently.

Issues: (i) Whether recovery of central excise duty by invocation of the extended limitation period was sustainable; (ii) Whether Nicotine Sulphate was classifiable under CTH 24039990 or CTH 29399900; (iii) Whether the manufacturer and purchaser were related parties for valuation of the goods supplied to the purchaser.

Issue (i): Whether recovery of central excise duty by invocation of the extended limitation period was sustainable.

Analysis: The manufacturer had informed the department of manufacture and classification of Nicotine Sulphate under Chapter 29 and had consistently disclosed the disputed classification in monthly ER-1 returns. The disclosed material did not support an allegation of suppression or misstatement necessary to invoke the extended period.

Conclusion: The demand for June 2015 to June 2017 issued by invoking the extended limitation period was barred by limitation, in favour of the assessee.

Issue (ii): Whether Nicotine Sulphate was classifiable under CTH 24039990 or CTH 29399900.

Analysis: The manufacturing process showed that the product was a vegetable alkaloid. Heading 29.39 covers alkaloids and their derivatives, and the Chapter 29 restriction concerning separately chemically defined compounds did not exclude this product because alkaloids are an identified exception under the HSN general notes. The report relied on by Revenue concerned a sample drawn from a third-party premises without the manufacturer's representative, tested more than a year after drawal contrary to the prescribed sampling standard, and included a classification opinion beyond the chemical examiner's analytical role. Factory samples tested subsequently described the product as an aqueous solution of Nicotine Sulphate and an organic chemical.

Conclusion: Nicotine Sulphate was correctly classifiable under CTH 29399900 and not under CTH 24039990; the consequential duty, interest and penalty were unsustainable, in favour of the assessee.

Issue (iii): Whether the manufacturer and purchaser were related parties for valuation of the goods supplied to the purchaser.

Analysis: The allegation of related-party status rested on one individual being a partner of the manufacturer and managing director of the purchaser. No supporting evidence established that the entities satisfied the statutory requirements of related persons. The valuation demand based on 110% of cost of production consequently lacked foundation.

Conclusion: The entities were not established to be related parties; the differential duty, interest and penalty on this count were unsustainable, in favour of the assessee.

Final Conclusion: The extended-period demand and the related-party valuation demand fail, while the declared Chapter 29 classification of Nicotine Sulphate prevails.

Ratio Decidendi: A disclosed tariff classification cannot attract the extended limitation period absent suppression, and Nicotine Sulphate, as a vegetable alkaloid derivative, falls under the alkaloid heading notwithstanding the general requirement of separate chemical definition in Chapter 29.

Issues: (i) Whether acquittal in proceedings for dishonour of cheque bars the civil suit through issue estoppel or res judicata; (ii) Whether the plaintiff proved voluntary execution and delivery of the cheque so as to establish the transaction and attract statutory presumptions.

Issue (i): Whether acquittal in proceedings for dishonour of cheque bars the civil suit through issue estoppel or res judicata.

Analysis: Findings in criminal proceedings were not relevant or binding in the civil suit. Criminal prosecution requires proof beyond reasonable doubt, whereas the civil claim is determined on a preponderance of probabilities. An acquittal may only establish failure to prove criminal guilt and does not establish that debt or civil liability has been disproved. The civil court must independently assess the evidence, even where the cheque, witnesses and material overlap.

Conclusion: The acquittal did not create issue estoppel or res judicata and did not bar the civil suit; this issue was against the appellant.

Issue (ii): Whether the plaintiff proved voluntary execution and delivery of the cheque so as to establish the transaction and attract statutory presumptions.

Analysis: Proof that the signature on a cheque belongs to the defendant is distinct from proof that the cheque was voluntarily executed and delivered as an operative instrument. Since execution was specifically denied, the plaintiff had the initial burden to establish voluntary execution before relying on statutory presumptions. The evidence did not satisfactorily prove the circumstances of delivery or execution: the material witness's account concerning payment, completion and delivery of the cheque was materially inconsistent. The trial court's inferences concerning the alleged borrowing were founded on surmise rather than evidence.

Conclusion: The plaintiff failed to prove voluntary execution and delivery of the cheque or the alleged transaction; consequently, the statutory presumptions did not arise. This issue was in favour of the appellant.

Final Conclusion: The civil money claim founded on the cheque could not be sustained because its execution and the underlying transaction were not established.

Ratio Decidendi: Where execution of a cheque is specifically denied, proof of the drawer's signature alone does not invoke presumptions of consideration and liability; the claimant must first prove voluntary execution and delivery of the cheque as an operative instrument.

Issues: Whether a demand based on alleged undervaluation of guarantees could be confirmed under Section 73 without prior scrutiny and investigation to ascertain revenue leakage.

Analysis: Following self-assessment, the statutory framework requires scrutiny of returns and permits audit, special audit and inspection or investigation mechanisms to verify whether transactions resulted in tax leakage. The authorities issued the demand notice and confirmed it without undertaking those measures to determine whether the guarantees were corporate guarantees or whether taxable value had been suppressed.

Conclusion: The demand-confirming order is unsustainable and is quashed; the matter is remitted for inspection or investigation and fresh determination, if warranted.

Issues: Whether the compounding fee was required to be computed under the CBDT Guidelines dated 16.05.2008 or under the revised Guidelines dated 17.10.2024.

Analysis: The applicability of the 2008 Guidelines had been determined in earlier proceedings between the same parties and that determination, affirmed in appeal, had attained finality. A direction to calculate and communicate the compounding fee was confined to quantification and did not permit reopening the settled question governing the applicable guidelines. The statutory power to issue compounding instructions could not override a final inter partes judicial determination. Further, the 2024 Guidelines did not apply because the application had not been rejected for a curable defect contemplated by those Guidelines.

Conclusion: The compounding fee must be recomputed strictly under the CBDT Guidelines dated 16.05.2008 after crediting the amount already paid by the assessee.

Issues: Whether writ jurisdiction should be exercised to adjudicate the disputed denial of input tax credit, interest and penalty despite the available statutory appellate remedy.

Analysis: The dispute required verification of the existence and utilisation of the ERP software, as well as the genuineness of the underlying transaction. These factual matters had not been tested by either side. Given the statutory appeal mechanism, writ jurisdiction was not appropriate for resolving that factual controversy. In the special circumstances, an opportunity was provided to pursue the statutory appeal without pre-deposit.

Outcome: The writ appeal was disposed of with liberty to file a statutory appeal within 30 days; the appellate authority was directed to entertain it without pre-deposit and decide it on merits within three months.

Issues: Whether an assessment order under the Uttar Pradesh Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 could be sustained where the show-cause notice was uploaded only on the GST portal after cancellation of the taxpayer's registration.

Analysis: Following cancellation of registration, the taxpayer was not obliged to monitor the GST portal. Service of a show-cause notice in those circumstances required recourse to an alternative mode of service. Uploading the notice solely on the portal denied an effective opportunity of hearing and breached the principles of natural justice.

Conclusion: The assessment order was vitiated for breach of the principles of natural justice and was quashed, in favour of the assessee.

Issues: (i) Whether unspent Government grant constituted taxable income; (ii) Whether interest on unutilised grant was allowable as a deduction; (iii) Whether depreciation could be denied for individual assets retired from active use within a block of assets.

Issue (i): Whether unspent Government grant constituted taxable income.

Analysis: The grants were received for implementing the specified micro-irrigation scheme and were subject to directions governing their utilisation. Applying the established treatment of project-specific Government grants, the amount could not be regarded as income of the assessee.

Conclusion: Unspent Government grant was not taxable income. The issue was decided in favour of the assessee.

Issue (ii): Whether interest on unutilised grant was allowable as a deduction.

Analysis: The obligation to pay interest on the unspent grant arose from the terms governing disbursement of the grant and was an ascertained business liability, rather than a contingent liability.

Conclusion: Interest payable on the unutilised grant was deductible. The issue was decided in favour of the assessee.

Issue (iii): Whether depreciation could be denied for individual assets retired from active use within a block of assets.

Analysis: Under the block-of-assets regime, individual assets in a block cannot be segregated for restricting depreciation where the business assets in the block are used. Simultaneous active use of every individual item is not required.

Conclusion: Depreciation could not be denied merely because particular assets within the block had been retired from active use. The issue was decided in favour of the assessee.

Final Conclusion: The deletions of additions relating to the grant and interest, and the allowance of depreciation, remain undisturbed; no substantial question of law arose.

Ratio Decidendi: A project-specific Government grant subject to mandated utilisation is not taxable income; liabilities arising from its governing terms are deductible when ascertained; and depreciation under the block-of-assets regime cannot be restricted by isolating individual inactive assets.

Issues: Whether the challenge to the seizure of gold and the pending customs show-cause proceedings should be adjudicated in writ jurisdiction before completion of statutory adjudication.

Analysis: The pending proceeding before the Additional Commissioner of Customs was considered an available forum for determination of the parties' claims. No view was expressed on the legality of the seizure, the show-cause notice, or the merits of the competing claims. The petitioners were directed to submit further material and participate in the adjudication, which must be concluded through a reasoned order after fair opportunity of hearing.

Outcome: The writ petitions were kept pending and adjourned sine die pending completion of adjudication by the customs authority.

Issues: (i) Whether construction of a mini agricultural market and agricultural facilitation centre for a government organisation qualified for exemption as a structure predominantly meant for use other than commerce, industry or business; (ii) Whether construction of residential units under government-approved housing projects was rendered to a competent government authority and eligible for exemption; (iii) Whether construction of a government high school under contracts entered into after 01.03.2015 qualified for exemption under Entry 14A.

Issue (i): Whether construction of a mini agricultural market and agricultural facilitation centre for a government organisation qualified for exemption as a structure predominantly meant for use other than commerce, industry or business.

Analysis: Entry 12A(c) of Notification No. 25/2012-ST dated 20.06.2012 exempts original works provided to Government, a local authority, or a governmental authority where the structure is predominantly meant for non-commercial use. Commercial use requires assessment of the factual purpose of the activity. Although the market infrastructure was created under a government drought-mitigation scheme, no statutory mandate for collection of user fees or evidence that such fees were deposited into the government treasury was established. The activity therefore did not fall within statutory public functions undertaken for non-commercial use.

Conclusion: The exemption was rightly denied and service tax on construction of the mini agricultural market remained confirmed, against the assessee.

Issue (ii): Whether construction of residential units under government-approved housing projects was rendered to a competent government authority and eligible for exemption.

Analysis: The work orders for residential units at Vasant Vihar and Chhatarpur were issued by the Executive Engineer of the M.P. Housing and Infrastructure Development Board and showed that the works formed part of government-approved residential housing projects. The basis that services were not supplied to a competent authority was therefore unsupported.

Conclusion: The service-tax demand on construction of residential units was set aside, in favour of the assessee.

Issue (iii): Whether construction of a government high school under contracts entered into after 01.03.2015 qualified for exemption under Entry 14A.

Analysis: Entry 14A restricts the exemption to original-work contracts entered into before 01.03.2015. The relevant school-construction work orders were dated 26.09.2016, after the prescribed date.

Conclusion: The exemption was rightly denied and service tax on construction of the government high school remained confirmed, against the assessee.

Final Conclusion: The residential-units demand was excluded, while the tax liabilities relating to the agricultural mini market and government high school were sustained.

Ratio Decidendi: An exemption for government-related original works requires fulfilment of the prescribed non-commercial-use conditions; infrastructure involving fee-based use is not shown to be non-commercial merely because it is created under a government scheme, and a contract-specific temporal condition for exemption must be strictly satisfied.

Issues: Whether penalty could be imposed for alleged manipulation of Form-38 where machinery parts imported for the assessee's own repair and maintenance use were accompanied by requisite documents and no evasion or attempted evasion of tax was established.

Analysis: The goods were accompanied by the tax invoice, goods receipt, Form-38 and Form-402, with no discrepancy in their description, quantity or value. The only irregularity was use of a correction marker in a Form-38 column concerning invoice-tax amount. The machinery parts were not intended for resale, and no material showed that the assessee dealt in or sold such plant and machinery. Further, the authorities had recorded no finding that tax had been evaded or that there was an attempt to evade it. The applicable precedents governed the matter.

Conclusion: Penalty under Section 54(1)(14) was not sustainable; the issue was decided in favour of the assessee and against the Revenue.

Issues: Whether goods detained in transit, where the petitioner claims ownership, must be released under Section 129(1)(a) rather than Section 129(1)(b) of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017.

Analysis: Section 129 of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 governs release of detained goods and conveyances. The applicable precedent established that, where the person seeking release is the owner of the goods, the release mechanism under Section 129(1)(a) applies; valuation cannot be enhanced for this purpose, and the penalty is to be determined with reference to the invoice and e-way bill. The record disclosed no basis to depart from that position.

Conclusion: The goods are required to be released under Section 129(1)(a) of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017, in favour of the assessee.

Issues: Whether a notice and demand order under the GST law issued in the name of a deceased proprietorship taxpayer are valid.

Analysis: Section 74(1) authorises issuance of notice to the person chargeable with tax, while an individual proprietor falls within the definition of "person" under Section 2(84). The taxpayer had died before issuance of both the notice and the consequential demand order, and this factual position was undisputed. The proceedings were thus initiated and concluded against a person who was no longer in existence.

Conclusion: The notice and demand order issued against the deceased taxpayer were without jurisdiction and void; the issue was decided in favour of the assessee.

Issues: Whether a demand of tax, interest and penalty exceeding the amount specified in the show-cause notice could be sustained.

Analysis: Section 75(7) prohibits a demand in the adjudication order from exceeding the amount specified in the notice and prohibits confirmation on grounds other than those stated in the notice. The notice specified a composite proposed demand of Rs. 78,059.50, whereas the impugned order raised Rs. 8,63,486.24 towards tax, interest and penalty. The demand was therefore ex facie beyond the notice.

Conclusion: The demand order was invalid for contravention of Section 75(7) and was set aside.

Issues: Whether prosecutions for wilful failure to furnish returns pursuant to search-assessment notices could be quashed under inherent jurisdiction when the alleged non-supply of seized material and the existence of wilful default were disputed factual matters.

Analysis: The alleged requests for search and seizure material, their receipt by the Department, supply of the material to the authorised representative, and the petitioner's ability and intention to furnish returns within the stipulated period were contested. The record did not prima facie establish that a request for the material had been made before expiry of the period prescribed in the notice. Inherent jurisdiction cannot be used to evaluate disputed evidence, determine the accused's factual defence, or decide the existence of wilful default or mens rea; those matters require adjudication on evidence at trial.

Conclusion: Quashing was not warranted; the disputed factual defences concerning wilful failure to file returns must be determined by the Trial Court.

Issues: Whether the dismissed writ petition should be restored to enable a challenge to Section 147-A and the reassessment proceedings.

Outcome: The review application was allowed, the earlier dismissal was set aside, and the writ petition was restored with liberty to amend; reassessment proceedings were stayed during its pendency.