Deemed assessment and scrutiny of tax claims: pre-assessment notices seeking explanations were not quashed in writ jurisdiction.

Returns qualify as deemed assessments only when filed in the prescribed form, within time, with the required documents and proof of tax payment. Under the Tamil Nadu Value Added Tax Act, 2006 and the Central Sales Tax Act, 1956, the assessing authority may scrutinise incomplete claims, including claims for concessional rate or exemption, and may call for declarations and supporting records before finalising assessment. Notices seeking explanation and materials were therefore not without jurisdiction merely because they were described as pre-assessment notices. Because the objection raised disputed facts as well as law, the challenge could not be terminated in writ proceedings at the threshold, and the dealers were required to respond before the assessing authority.

---

---

Issues: Whether the pre-assessment notices issued under the Tamil Nadu Value Added Tax Act, 2006 and the Central Sales Tax Act, 1956 could be quashed in writ proceedings on the ground that the petitioners were already deemed to have been assessed and that the notices were without jurisdiction.

Analysis: The returns filed by a dealer are entitled to be treated as deemed assessments only if they are filed in the prescribed form, within the prescribed time, with the prescribed documents and proof of payment of tax. The statutory scheme under the Tamil Nadu Value Added Tax Act, 2006 and the Central Sales Tax Act, 1956 permits the assessing authority to scrutinize incomplete or unsupported claims, especially claims for concessional rate or exemption, and to call for declarations and supporting records before finalising the assessment. The Court held that the impugned proceedings were only notices calling for explanation and materials, that mere nomenclature as a pre-assessment notice did not vitiate the proceedings, and that the objection involved disputed facts as well as law. Such issues could not be foreclosed in writ jurisdiction at the threshold.

Conclusion: The notices were not liable to be quashed and the petitioners were required to respond before the assessing authority; the challenge failed.

---