GST Common Portal procedures permit an assessment or adjudication order to be uploaded through DRC-07 on the date of passing or later. Delayed uploading may allow post-limitation publication and impair taxpayers' appellate rights. Disclosure of the actual upload date is therefore necessary to protect limitation and appeal periods. The High Court sought further GSTN instructions on compliance with upload-date disclosure directions within two weeks and listed the matter for further hearing, without final adjudication.

Anticipatory bail under the CGST Act is not maintainable merely because summons have been issued under section 70. Such summons do not designate the recipient as an accused or independently create a sustainable apprehension of arrest. Pre-arrest protection requires an arrest-authorisation order under section 69, based on reasons to believe and communicated to the affected person. Searches, continuing investigation, or the prospect of a future arrest do not replace that prerequisite; applications without it are premature.

Subsequent GST registration was directed to be restored where the taxpayer had neither carried on business under an earlier cancelled registration nor sought its revival. Maintaining cancellation of the later registration would have prevented the taxpayer from conducting business and discharging GST obligations. As no impediment to restoration was identified, the later registration could be restored without reviving the earlier registration.

GST adjudication was set aside and remitted for fresh consideration because relevant materials had not been produced before the adjudicating authority. The taxpayer must receive an adequate opportunity to submit its reply and supporting documents, enabling the authority to reconsider the matter on a complete factual record. The remand addresses the inability to place relevant material during the original adjudication rather than determining the substantive GST liability.

Delayed writ challenges to an assessment under Section 62 are examined through the explanation for inaction, the timing of GST-registration cancellation, and evidence of recovery action. The assessment preceded both the later writ petition and the registration cancellation. No satisfactory explanation addressed the period before cancellation, and no material established that the assessed demand was being recovered through further proceedings. Subsequent filing of a return and claimed discharge of tax liability formed part of the challenge.

Omission of Rule 96(10) of the Central Goods and Services Tax Rules, 2017, without a saving or sunset clause, prevents the omitted subordinate rule from being applied to pending refund proceedings. The governing principle is that subordinate legislation ceases to operate upon omission unless the rule-making authority expressly preserves its continuing effect. Refund claims cannot therefore be rejected solely by reference to Rule 96(10) after its omission, and proceedings founded exclusively on that rule are unsustainable.

Section 75(4) of the Uttarakhand Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 requires a personal hearing whenever an adverse decision against a taxable person is contemplated, even if no separate request for hearing was made. An assessment order imposing tax and penalty without that opportunity is invalid. The assessment order was quashed, while the Department retained liberty to issue a fresh order after granting a hearing.

Statutory appellate remedies are the prescribed avenue for challenges to penalty proceedings involving alleged breaches of natural justice, insufficient time, the initiating officer's competence, and the applicable penalty provision. These grounds require examination of the adjudication record and statutory framework in appellate review. Writ intervention is not indicated absent an exceptional basis, while the appellate remedy remains available and the substantive challenges have not been finally examined.

GST assessment proceedings must be initiated against a living person; an assessment order issued in the name of a deceased sole proprietor has no legal effect unless the legal representative is brought into the proceedings. Section 93 permits recovery of the deceased person's GST dues from the business or estate, but does not validate an assessment made against the deceased. Such an assessment is invalid and liable to be set aside. Fresh assessment proceedings may be initiated only after notice to and an opportunity of hearing for the legal representative, with recovery confined to the deceased person's estate.

GST demand challenges involving alleged divergence between the show-cause notice and confirmed demand, tariff classification, applicable notifications, hearing rights, or cross-examination require factual scrutiny before the Appellate Authority. The statutory appellate remedy under the CGST Act provides for a hearing, prescribed pre-deposit, and consequential stay of recovery for the balance disputed amount. Writ jurisdiction under Article 226 should not be invoked where that efficacious remedy is available; such grievances must be pursued through the statutory appeal.

Rule 138B permits physical verification of a conveyance by a proper officer authorised by the Commissioner or an empowered officer. Verification undertaken by an authorised officer, followed by fresh notice, supply of relevant material, personal hearing and consideration of the reply, does not establish a jurisdictional defect or breach of natural justice. Although an alternative statutory appeal does not wholly exclude writ jurisdiction, intervention requires exceptional grounds, including fundamental-rights infringement, natural-justice breach, jurisdictional excess or a challenge to legislative validity. Factual and procedural objections to confiscation adjudication should therefore be pursued through the statutory appellate mechanism.

Limitation for GST proceedings under Section 74 is determined by the dates of the substantive show cause notice and adjudication order. Form GST DRC-01 is an electronic summary accompanying the notice, and Form GST DRC-07 is an electronic summary of the order; later dates on those forms do not replace the dates of the substantive instruments or make them time-barred. Challenges concerning fraud, suppression, input tax credit, computation, penalty and evidentiary sufficiency require factual examination and should ordinarily be pursued through the statutory appellate remedy rather than writ jurisdiction, absent denial of hearing or a patent jurisdictional defect.

Monetary-limit compliance governs departmental GST appeals even where the Commissioner authorises an application under Section 112(3). Appeals below the prescribed threshold require the Revenue to specifically plead and establish a recognised exception under the applicable litigation-control framework. A bare assertion of the Commissioner's permission does not prove a residual exception without material demonstrating a case-specific recorded opinion. Maintainability must be determined before the underlying tax merits are considered. Where no recognised exception is established, a below-threshold departmental appeal is liable to dismissal at the admission stage, leaving the substantive tax dispute undecided.

GST interest on delayed GSTR-3B liabilities remains payable on the cash component until the Electronic Cash Ledger is debited, even where sufficient funds were deposited and continuously available earlier. A ledger credit evidences deposit with the Government but does not discharge an identified tax liability; debit is required for payment. The proviso excluding continuously available cash-ledger balances from interest computation operates prospectively and does not apply to earlier periods. A show-cause notice causes no defect where the taxpayer received the demand computation, responded fully, and suffered no prejudice. Failure to provide a requested personal hearing breached statutory requirements, but remand was unnecessary absent surviving substantive prejudice. Interest demands remain subject to reconciliation and credit without double recovery.

Laminated HDPE woven geomembrane used for waterproof pond lining, including Biofloc applications, is classified under tariff sub-heading 59111000 as a textile fabric for technical use. HDPE tapes and strips below 5 mm fall within Section XI, and their weaving produces textile fabric; lamination with plastic on both sides does not displace classification where the material serves a technical purpose under Chapter Note 8 to Chapter 59. The product attracted GST at 12 per cent up to 21 September 2025 and 5 per cent from 22 September 2025, following its placement under the relevant GST rate entries for tariff heading 5911.

Outdoor playground equipment, including qualifying spare parts, is classified under tariff item 95069990 as sports goods and taxable at 5%. Outdoor gym equipment and its qualifying spare parts are classified under tariff item 95069190 as equipment for general physical exercise and taxable at 18%. Parts solely or principally used with Chapter 95 articles generally follow the equipment classification. Ball and roller bearings remain separately classifiable under Heading 8482 because that specific tariff entry prevails over the general parts classification; their applicable tariff entry depends on their specifications, and they are taxable at 18%.

Tax payable is material to prosecution for failure to furnish a return under Section 276CC because the statutory exception depends on the assessee's tax liability. Where no assessment or other tax determination exists, the complaint does not allege tax payable, and a refund claim remains unaddressed, prosecution is misconceived. Wilful failure is also essential: the statutory presumption of culpable mental state may be rebutted through evidence showing no intent to evade tax. Evidence that property was jointly acquired, loan-financed, and that sale consideration was received by the spouse rebutted wilfulness. The convictions and sentences were set aside, and the assessee was acquitted.

Reassessment proceedings alleging bogus purchases require the Assessing Officer to decide objections to reopening through a separate speaking order and communicate it before completing reassessment. Incorporating the response to those objections only in the reassessment order does not satisfy this mandatory procedure and makes the assumption of jurisdiction unsustainable. Reassessments for the relevant assessment years were therefore quashed, while challenges to the alleged bogus-purchase additions became infructuous. Remand was declined because restoring jurisdictionally invalid proceedings would revive stale matters; the Revenue may proceed in accordance with law.

Filing a first appeal against a disputed tax demand does not automatically stay recovery. A stay requires valid reasons and a specific stay petition; where no petition was filed before recovery, the taxpayer cannot claim a stay as of right or obtain refund merely because the appeal remained pending. Refund of the amount already recovered was therefore declined. However, substantial recovery already made may justify protection against further coercive recovery until disposal of the first appeal.

Gains from share and securities sales retained their capital-gains character because no factual distinction from later assessment years justified recharacterisation as business income. Import-purchase payments to a Japanese non-resident associated enterprise remained free from withholding-tax disallowance, as identical later-year determinations governed the issue. Rule 8D could not support an additional section 14A administrative-expenditure disallowance unless the Assessing Officer examined the accounts, recorded dissatisfaction with the taxpayer's own disallowance, and identified expenditure related to exempt income. Formulaic application without these steps required deletion of the additional disallowance. The Revenue's appeal failed, while the taxpayer's appeal succeeded on section 14A.