https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=789605 Tax paid on departmental audit advice for a transaction later found non-taxable could not be retained merely because a refund claim was rejected as time-barred or not separately challenged. The court treated the assessee's suo motu adjustment as a technical correction of an erroneous payment, not a mala fide act, and held that procedural rejection of refund did not validate the levy. Once the foundation of taxability failed, the consequential service tax demand, interest and penalty could not survive, and the impugned orders were annulled. en-us Wed, 08 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0530 Fri, 10 Apr 2026 09:02:41 +0530 TaxTMI RSS Generator https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=789605 Tax paid on departmental audit advice for a transaction later found non-taxable could not be retained merely because a refund claim was rejected as time-barred or not separately challenged. The court treated the assessee's suo motu adjustment as a technical correction of an erroneous payment, not a mala fide act, and held that procedural rejection of refund did not validate the levy. Once the foundation of taxability failed, the consequential service tax demand, interest and penalty could not survive, and the impugned orders were annulled. Case-Laws Service Tax Wed, 08 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0530 https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=789605