Service-tax demands for the pre-1 July 2012 positive-list regime require the show-cause notice to identify the applicable taxable-service category and statutory basis; aggregated receipt differences without classification do not provide a valid foundation for demand. For the negative-list period, liability must rest on the applicable charging provision, including Section 66B, rather than superseded positive-list provisions. Differences between ST-3 returns, audited financial statements and Form 26AS data alone do not establish wilful suppression or intent to evade tax. Without supporting verification or evidence of such intent, extended limitation, consequential interest and penalties cannot be sustained.

Actual costs recovered from foreign entities without markup may constitute reimbursable expenses rather than consideration for taxable services under the reverse charge mechanism. Invoices segregating taxable and non-taxable charges, transport and clearance records, and chartered-accountant certification can establish that air freight, ocean freight, and pure-agent charges were recovered at actual cost. Where no documentary evidence supports an alleged markup, the recovered amounts are distinguishable from taxable service consideration. The absence of a review challenge to the finding on the extended limitation period also remains relevant.

Provisional attachment of cash requires a sufficient nexus between the recovered funds and proceeds generated by unlawful activity. The material linked a liquor warehouse to a double-trip supply arrangement, repeated use of transport documents and excise-duty evasion. No independently verifiable bank withdrawal or contemporaneous trader receipts supported the cash's lawful source; cash-book entries and stock-register explanations did not independently corroborate it or exclude unrecorded transactions. The unexplained cash, alleged benefit from the transactions and evidence of duty evasion were treated cumulatively as establishing the nexus, resulting in continued provisional attachment as proceeds of crime.

Continued Look Out Circulars require material showing a genuine risk of evasion, non-compliance, abscondence, or obstruction; a pending money-laundering investigation alone does not justify restricting travel. The High Court found no flight-risk material where the petitioners complied with summonses, provided information, remained available, and completed foreign travel without impeding the investigation. As no trial-court travel restriction existed, the Circulars were quashed, subject to advance travel intimation, contact details, and continued cooperation with the investigation.

Resolution plans must satisfy statutory feasibility requirements through a complete and accurate information memorandum, particularly where the corporate debtor's essential land asset depends on regulatory approvals. Creditor claims require reconciliation with final determinations and recoveries, while a corporate guarantor obtains secured financial creditor status through subrogation to the amount paid. A plan cannot assume SEZ de-notification or land-use conversion without the lessor's consent and regulatory completion; omission of those processes impairs informed bidding. Commercial wisdom cannot cure material inaccuracies or replace reasoned consideration of statutory feasibility objections. Fresh expressions of interest must be invited on a corrected information memorandum under a newly appointed resolution professional.

Approved resolution plans bind governmental creditors and extinguish pre-CIRP claims not retained in the plan, applying the clean slate principle to government dues arising from export-obligation defaults. DEL orders issued during the statutory moratorium are void ab initio where they constitute adverse coercive action against the corporate debtor. Continuing DEL status to enforce extinguished pre-CIRP liabilities is incompatible with the binding effect of the approved plan, including where the government's operational-debt claim received nil treatment. Verification of new management credentials and action for independent fresh defaults remain permissible in accordance with law.

Dismissals effected through composite charge-sheet-cum-dismissal orders, without a disciplinary inquiry after employees reported at transferred locations, breached principles of natural justice; the labour awards declaring the terminations illegal remained operative. Compensation awarded before commencement of the corporate insolvency resolution process constituted a crystallised entitlement, distinguishable from an unadjudicated employment claim pending approval of a resolution plan. Court deposits securing that compensation did not become recoverable by new management merely because they remained deposited. Employees could withdraw the deposits with accrued interest in full settlement of service-related claims, with no further service-related benefits payable.

Claims relating to periods before approval of a resolution plan are extinguished under the corporate insolvency resolution framework. NCLT observations applying that position fall within its jurisdiction. An asserted conflict with State tax legislation does not by itself create jurisdictional error, because allowing State tax claims to bypass the resolution process would undermine the binding effect of an approved resolution plan. Writ jurisdiction should not be invoked to challenge such observations where the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code provides a statutory appellate remedy before the NCLAT.

Cross-segment futures and options trading involving aggressive, allegedly inexecutable futures orders and substantially larger opposite options positions was treated prima facie as derivatives price manipulation and a fraudulent or unfair trade practice. Directors controlling the entities were considered prima facie vicariously liable and jointly and severally accountable for impounding gains attributed to their respective companies. Repetitive conduct, concentrated trading, potential dissipation of gains, and market-integrity concerns supported urgent interim safeguards. Ex parte market-access restraints, impounding and asset-preservation measures, disclosure obligations, and cooperation requirements were imposed pending investigation, subject to objections and a personal hearing.

Special Additional Duty remained payable because the claimed customs exemption became unavailable after amendment of the Thirteenth Schedule to the Finance Act, 2011. Clearance through the RMS system based on the importer's declarations, followed by payment only after departmental intimation, supported invocation of the extended limitation period and recovery of the duty. However, interest and penalty on Special Additional Duty require substantive statutory authority. In its absence, Customs Act provisions on interest and penalty cannot be invoked for that levy; the duty liability remains, but the related interest and penalty do not.

Project-import assessment under Heading 98.01 depends on actual importation occurring after registration of the relevant project contract, not on the date of an earlier purchase order. Consignments imported after registration may seek the benefit, subject to remaining prescribed requirements; consignments imported earlier do not qualify. Post-clearance revision of a Bill of Entry is available under Section 18A, subject to statutory and prescribed conditions. Its non obstante clause gives that specific revision mechanism priority over the general post-clearance amendment restriction in Section 149.

Section 144C(13) requires a final assessment to be completed within one month from the end of the month in which Dispute Resolution Panel directions are received. Upload of the directions on the ITBA portal on 19 December 2025 constituted receipt by the Assessing Officer, making 31 January 2026 the statutory deadline. The final assessment order issued on 11 March 2026 exceeded this mandatory time limit, was time-barred, and was quashed.

Penalty for under-reporting or misreporting is unsustainable where the underlying addition has been deleted or remains subject to verification and fresh determination. A bona fide error in the acquisition date of bonus shares falls within the exclusion for a fully disclosed explanation where acquisition and sale particulars are disclosed and the explanation is not shown to be false. Misreporting additionally requires identification of a specified statutory circumstance; the charge is inconsistent where penalty is computed at the rate applicable to under-reporting rather than misreporting. These conditions require deletion of the penalty.

Section 43CA applies where consideration for transfer of land or building held as stock-in-trade is below its stamp-duty value. Reciprocal conveyances of equivalent plots, undertaken under a pre-existing arrangement to consolidate fragmented ownership after layout development, involved valuable non-cash consideration notwithstanding nil monetary consideration in the deeds. As each transfer was matched by an equivalent plot with identical guideline, stamp-duty and fair-market values, no shortfall against stamp-duty value was established. Section 43CA was therefore inapplicable and the related addition was deleted.

Under the faceless assessment framework, an Assessment Unit may perform Assessing Officer functions, including issuing a scrutiny notice; the National Faceless Assessment Centre need not issue such notices exclusively. ESOP expenditure incurred to attract, retain and compensate employees qualifies as business expenditure where the reimbursement liability is accrued and ascertainable as employees render services during the vesting period. Later exercise, lapse or forfeiture affects discharge or adjustment rather than accrual. Disallowance for withholding failure requires an identified applicable tax-deduction provision and, for non-resident payments, chargeability to tax in India. Compensation for extinguishing a right to sue does not attract withholding merely because payment was made.

Pending appeal, recovery of the balance outstanding tax demand was stayed for 180 days or until disposal of the appeal, whichever occurred first, conditional on payment of 20% following verification of the claimed refund adjustment. No view was expressed on the merits of the underlying appeal. The interim protection applied only after fulfilment of the stipulated payment condition and did not determine the taxpayer's substantive tax liability.

Compulsorily convertible debentures retain their debt character until actual conversion into shares, despite their hybrid nature and absence of ordinary principal repayment. Transfer-pricing analysis must determine the arm's length price of the international transaction actually undertaken and cannot recast such debentures as equity solely because conversion is compulsory. Debt-equity recharacterisation is separately available where an arrangement is declared an impermissible avoidance arrangement under the prescribed Chapter X-A safeguards and procedure, which were not invoked. Recharacterising the debentures as equity, determining interest at nil, and making the resulting transfer-pricing adjustment were therefore impermissible; the adjustment was deleted.

Income from sale of stock-in-trade accrues when full consideration is received, possession is delivered and the transaction is recognised, notwithstanding later registration of the conveyance. Transfer is assessed on substantive completion of the transaction, applying part performance and substance over form, rather than subsequent procedural registration. A deeming provision for transfer of stock-in-trade requires a taxable transfer in the relevant previous year; it cannot apply merely because an instrument for an earlier completed and taxed sale is registered later. The relevant tax year therefore remains the year of substantive transfer, avoiding double taxation.

Recovery of the outstanding tax demand was stayed for six months pending disposal of the appeal, conditional on payment of 20% of the demand by the stipulated date. The interim protection did not finally determine the transfer-pricing additions or the arm's-length-price contention. The balance demand remained stayed subject to compliance with the payment condition.

Comparable Uncontrolled Price Method permits direct comparison with an uncontrolled transaction where identical raw materials are supplied by an unrelated vendor. Where an associated enterprise merely intermediates, adds no value, and its mark-up is reversed through credit notes so that the effective purchase price matches the vendor price, CUP is the appropriate method. Transactional Net Margin Method and retained comparables are not justified on those facts. Including omitted operating revenue under DRP directions would also remove the proposed adjustment. Accordingly, no arm's-length price adjustment is warranted for such routed raw-material purchases.