Maintainability of appeal - monetary limit involved in the appeal - HELD THAT:-Having regard to the low tax effect in the matter, we decline to entertain this appeal. However, the question of law, if any, is kept open for adjudication in an appropriate case... ... ...

Circular No. 45/2026-Customs F. No. 190354/133/2025-TRU Government of India Ministry of Finance Department of Revenue Tax Research Unit Room No. 14020, Kartavya Bhawan-I New Delhi, dated the 9th October, 2026 To, All Principal Chief Commissioner/Chief Commissioner of Customs/Customs (Preventive), All Principal Chief Commissioner/Chief Commissioner of Customs & Central Tax, All Principal Commissioner/Commissioner of Customs/Customs (Preventive), ... ... ...

MINISTRY OF ELECTRONICS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY NOTIFICATION New Delhi, the 22nd October, 2024 S.O. 4623(E).- In exercise of the powers conferred by sub-sections (1) and (2) of section 70 of the Information Technology Act, 2000 (21 of 2000) (hereinafter referred to as the said Act), the Central Government hereby declares the computer resources relating to the Core Banking Solution (CBS), Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS), National Electronic Fund Transfer (NEFT), Immediate Payment Se... ... ...

Certification requirements now use the term "specified person" in place of "associated person" and define the persons covered, including relevant employees of foreign portfolio investors and foreign venture capital investors working in India. Certification may be obtained through a NISM-specified course or programme, alongside existing routes. Certificate validity and renewal may extend beyond three years where specified by the Board. Related terminology is updated for debenture trustees and self-regulatory organisations.

State Forensic Science Laboratory, Police Line Campus, Tikarapara, Raipur, Chhattisgarh, is designated as an Examiner of Electronic Evidence within India under section 79A of the Information Technology Act, 2000. Its authorised scope comprises Computer (Media) Forensics and Mobile Devices Forensics, covering computer-media and mobile-device forensic work.

Karnataka Bank Limited's computer resources relating to its Core Banking Solution, Real Time Gross Settlement and Unified Payments Interface Switch, including associated dependencies, are declared protected systems as Critical Information Infrastructure. Access is authorised for designated employees, authorised managed-service-provider personnel and third-party vendors on a need-based basis, and consultants, regulators, government officials, auditors and stakeholders authorised in writing on a case-to-case basis. The designation takes effect upon publication in the Official Gazette.

Vault Managers must implement procedures for deposit, storage and withdrawal; maintain security policies addressing operational and cyber threats; and periodically reconcile physical bullion against their own records and records maintained by depositories, clearing corporations, asset management companies or custodians. Bullion underlying bullion related instruments must remain within the vaulting system and be segregated instrument-wise and entity-wise. Every Vault Manager must appoint a compliance officer, indemnify beneficial owners for losses caused during vaulting services, and cannot create bullion related instruments or deposit stored bullion in its own name.

Appointments to the three Grievance Appellate Committees are revised under rule 3A of the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021. Committee 1 and Committee 2 receive substituted whole-time members, while Committee 3 is reconstituted with an ex officio Chairperson and two whole-time members. Each whole-time member holds office for three years from assuming office or until further orders, whichever occurs earlier.

Central Government designates the Centre of Excellence in Digital Forensics (CoEDF) as an Examiner of Electronic Evidence within India under section 79A of the Information Technology Act, 2000. The authorised scope covers Computer (Media) Forensics and Mobile Devices Forensics. Gazette Notification No. 3390, dated 8 August 2023, is rescinded.

Proposed GST reforms would remove the statutory arrest mechanism, raise the prosecution threshold, reduce residual penalties and introduce a minimum aggregate tax threshold for specified demand notices. They would also expand input tax credit and refund eligibility, automate key refund stages, simplify registration and e-commerce registration, and introduce return-mismatch correction and objections to credit blocking. Transit interception would be intelligence-led and restricted, while export, reverse-charge e-invoicing, zero-rating, intellectual-property treatment and selected goods and services would receive targeted changes. Legal effect remains subject to enactment, prescribed conditions and implementation measures.

GST return mismatches are identified as a recurrent basis for tax demands notwithstanding the need to establish actual short payment. An alternate mechanism for amendment of liability and input tax credit (ITC) in returns is proposed to take effect from the April 2027 return period. The mechanism is intended to enable correction and reconciliation of return data, reduce mismatch-based demand notices and system-generated intimations, and strengthen ITC integrity throughout the supply chain.

Sections 122(1A) and 132(1) are analysed as requiring cumulative proof that a person orchestrated a covered fraudulent transaction and personally retained its illicit economic benefit. Liability is not based solely on office, professional involvement, signing or filing records, or receipt of an ordinary commercial payment. Proof should identify both the act of orchestration and a financial trail establishing the benefit retained. The same threshold is applied to civil penalties, prosecution, and arrest-related action, with coercive measures not resting on suspicion or incomplete evidence.

Income deemed to be received includes prescribed recognised provident-fund accretions, transferred provident-fund balances, and specified employer or Central Government pension contributions. Specified dividends are treated as income in the tax year when declared, distributed, or paid, while interim dividends are income when unconditionally made available to the entitled member. Differences in drafting may require fresh interpretation, and deeming rules may create timing mismatches where income is accounted for or realised in a later year.

Proposals contemplate reducing the maximum general penalty under section 125 and introducing a common minimum monetary threshold for demand notices under sections 73, 74 and 74A, including pending unadjudicated cases when implemented. Comprehensive officer guidelines would address notice and order quality, timeliness, fraud-based grounds, and natural-justice safeguards. Recommended changes to blocked input tax credit would cover specified business inputs and losses. An optional ARQP scheme is approved in principle for eligible small B2C taxpayers.

GST confiscation challenges ordinarily proceed through the statutory appeal. Direct writ intervention requires an established jurisdictional defect, genuine denial of natural justice, infringement of fundamental rights, or a challenge to the governing law. Allegations concerning document supply, hearing, evidentiary evaluation, findings or reasons must be tied to a specific defect; where they require examination of the record, they generally remain matters for appellate review. Compliance with filing conditions, including limitation and pre-deposit requirements, remains necessary.

The resolution professional supervises repayment-plan implementation and may seek directions from the Adjudicating Authority. Completion requires a notice and implementation report to persons bound by the plan and the Adjudicating Authority. If the plan ends prematurely, the resolution professional must report payments, reasons, and unsatisfied claims; a debtor or unsatisfied creditor may seek a bankruptcy order. PGIRP-5 records implementation, discharge, and premature-closure information, while quarterly PGIRP-6 records process status, stays, withdrawals, delays, and completed activities.

Excise-duty liability cannot rest solely on a discrepancy in an ER-6 return where the corresponding ER-1 return is available but not examined and no independent evidence establishes unaccounted or clandestine clearance. The extended limitation period is unavailable where the relevant ER-6 return and the assessee's explanation were already within departmental knowledge, because suppression is not established. A show-cause notice issued after the normal period is therefore time-barred, leaving the related duty demand and penalty without an adequate evidentiary or limitation basis.

Extended limitation for central excise and erroneous-refund recovery requires suppression of facts with intent to evade duty. Below-cost cement sales under an area-based exemption, without evidence of additional consideration flowing back, do not by themselves establish suppressed value or evasion, particularly where refund claims underwent departmental verification. For freight transactions before 1 July 2012, service tax liability under the applicable rule is confined to freight actually paid; the excess collected from customers is transportation profit rather than taxable freight. Consequently, the excise, service-tax and refund-recovery demands, with related interest and penalties, were unsustainable, while the independent fixed penalty under Section 77 remained operative.

CENVAT credit on capital goods is disallowed only where they are exclusively used to manufacture exempt final products. Where a manufacturer produces both dutiable and exempt biscuits and no exclusive exempt use is established, credit on capital goods, inputs and input services remains available; the reversal demand is unsustainable. Recording credit availment and utilisation in RG-23C registers and ER-1 returns negates suppression of facts or wilful misstatement. The extended limitation period therefore cannot apply, leaving the associated interest and penalty unsustainable.

Extended-period service-tax recovery from a subcontractor requires established suppression, misstatement, fraud, collusion, or comparable conduct intended to evade tax. A bona fide belief that no separate liability arose after the main contractor paid service tax on the full contract consideration, combined with conflicting views on subcontractor taxability, does not establish those conditions. Limitation therefore prevents an extended-period demand where the required default and intent are not proved.