2007 (7) TMI 93

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....y viz. Habasit Iakoka Pvt. Ltd who are the appellants in the second appeal. The Indian company had received services of "online information & data base access and/or retrieval service" provided by the Swiss company during the period from 1-4-2001 to 31-3-2003. As per Rule 2(1)(d) (iv) of the Service Tax Rules, 1994, w.e.f. 16-8-2002, "person liable for paying service tax" means, in relation to any....

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....vices provided in India but does not have any office in India, such person or any other person authorized by him shall pay the service tax. Accordingly, for the said period, the lower authorities demanded service tax from the Swiss company in respect of the services provided by them to the Indian company during such period. The authorities ordered recovery of the tax from the Indian company whose ....

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....It is further argued that the appellants were under a bona fide belief that they were not liable to pay Service tax on the services in question and, therefore, they happened to withhold payment for some time. In the circumstances, according to ld. consultant, the appellants are entitled to the benefit of Section 80 of the Finance Act, 1994. In the context of claiming the benefit of amnesty scheme,....

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....failure of the appellants to pay service tax. The appellants never claimed the benefit of the amnesty scheme introduced by the Board. Even otherwise, that claim was in tended to give relief to those service-providers who had not yet got themselves registered with the department. Such non-compliant service-providers were enabled to get themselves registered, file returns and discharge past liabilit....