Technical defect in appeal description cannot defeat a settlement declaration when the appeal was actually filed and received.

A declaration under the Kar Vivad Samadhan Scheme, 1998 could not be rejected for a mere technical error in addressing the pending appeal to the wrong appellate authority. The appeal had in fact been filed with the department, and there was no categorical denial of receipt or timely objection that the papers were unacceptable or required refiling before the proper authority. The Court treated the defect as curable and held that the assessee could not be penalised for it. The declaration was therefore required to be processed on merits under the scheme, and the rejection was unsustainable.

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Issues: Whether the declaration under the Kar Vivad Samadhan Scheme, 1998 could be rejected on the ground that the pending appeal had been addressed to the wrong appellate authority.

Analysis: The declaration under the Scheme was made in respect of an appeal that had been filed and was pending with the department. The record did not show any categorical denial of receipt of the appeal, and the department had not informed the assessee that the appeal papers were unacceptable on a technical ground or returned them for presentation before the proper authority. In these circumstances, the Court held that the assessee could not be penalised for a curable defect in description of the appellate authority, and the declaration had to be considered on merits under the scheme.

Conclusion: The rejection of the declaration was unsustainable and the assessee was entitled to have its declaration processed under the Kar Vivad Samadhan Scheme, 1998.

Ratio Decidendi: A declaration under a beneficial settlement scheme cannot be rejected for a mere technical mistake in addressing a pending appeal where the appeal was in fact filed, received, and not shown to have been treated as invalid by the department in time.

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