Delegated revisional power determines the correct statutory remedy; a revisional order cannot be treated as an original appealable order.

Where a Deputy Commissioner cancelled VAT registration while exercising delegated revisional powers under Section 75(1)(a) of the Gujarat Value Added Tax Act, the true nature of the order determined the remedy. The Gujarat HC held that such an order was challengeable by revision under Section 75(1)(b), not by appeal under Section 73, because Section 73 applies to original orders and was not attracted to a revisional order. The Tribunal therefore erred in rejecting the revision as not maintainable. The impugned rejection was set aside and the matter remitted to the Tribunal for decision on merits.

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Issues: Whether a challenge to the Deputy Commissioner's order cancelling registration retrospectively, passed while exercising delegated revisional powers, was maintainable before the Tribunal by way of revision under Section 75(1)(b) of the Gujarat Value Added Tax Act, 2003, or whether the remedy was an appeal under Section 73 of that Act.

Analysis: The order under challenge was not a simple original order under the cancellation provision alone. It was passed by the Deputy Commissioner while exercising the Commissioner's revisional powers under Section 75(1)(a), as reflected in the order itself and in the accompanying notice. Once the authority acted in the capacity of the Commissioner under the delegated revisional route, the correct remedy against such order was the statutory revision contemplated by Section 75(1)(b). Section 73, which governs appeals from original orders, was therefore not attracted.

Conclusion: The revision application before the Tribunal was maintainable and the Tribunal erred in rejecting it on the ground that an appeal alone lay.

Final Conclusion: The impugned order rejecting the revision was set aside and the matter was sent back to the Tribunal for decision on merits.

Ratio Decidendi: When an authority passes an order in exercise of delegated revisional powers, the statutory remedy must be tested by the true nature of that order, and the remedy provided against a revisional order cannot be displaced by treating it as an appealable original order.

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