Cenvat credit survives curable invoice defects when receipt and use of duty-paid inputs are undisputed.

Cenvat credit cannot be denied for curable invoice irregularities where duty payment, receipt of inputs, and their use in manufacture are not disputed. The tribunal treated hand-written serial numbers as sufficient under Rule 11 of the Cenvat Credit Rules, 2002 because the rule requires serial numbering, not printed numbering. It also held that credit on a Xerox copy of an invoice could not be rejected when the substantive facts of receipt and use of duty-paid inputs were uncontested. The procedural defects were therefore insufficient to defeat the credit claim, and the denial was set aside.

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Issues: Whether Cenvat credit could be denied merely because the invoices bore hand-written serial numbers or because credit was taken on a Xerox copy of an invoice, when receipt and use of the inputs were not disputed.

Analysis: Rule 11 of the Cenvat Credit Rules, 2002 requires invoices to be serially numbered, but the requirement does not insist that the serial number must be printed. The record showed that the invoices were numbered, though by hand, and there was no dispute that the inputs covered by those invoices were received in the factory and used in manufacture. The defect was therefore procedural in nature. The same principle applied to the Xerox copy invoice, as the substantive fact of receipt and use of duty-paid inputs was not controverted. In such circumstances, substantial benefit of credit cannot be denied for mere documentary irregularity.

Conclusion: Cenvat credit could not be denied on these procedural objections and the assessee was entitled to the credit.

Final Conclusion: The denial of Cenvat credit was set aside and the appeal succeeded.

Ratio Decidendi: Cenvat credit cannot be refused for a curable procedural defect in invoice form when duty payment, receipt of inputs, and their use in the manufacture of final products are not disputed.

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