2019 (10) TMI 414

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....king and Other Financial Services in India. During the period 2006-07 to 2008-09, appellant paid SWIFT charges to one Belgium company M/s Society for Worldwide Inter-Bank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) for the purpose of transmission of financial and other related messages internationally. DGCEI initiated industrywide enquiry on levy of service tax on SWIFT charges paid by the Banks of India on reverse charge basis and issued letter date 29-2-2009 to the appellant in that connection. Unlike other Banking institutions, appellant decided not to dispute the service tax liability and made prompt payment of service tax of Rs. 25,47,642/- along with interest of Rs. 4,57,974/- for the period between 2006-09 and informed DGCEI regarding such p....

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.... charges was interpretational in nature during the relevant period and there was no wilful suppression on the part of appellant to evade payment of tax of such miniscule when it had promptly discharged service tax liability of more than Rs.500 crores (approximately) during the relevant period. Further argument raised by the Learned Counsel for appellant is on non-application of provision of section 73(4) of the Finance Act when prompt payment of service tax with interest was made, upon the same being pointed out by the Investigating Agency such as DGCEI that would cover appellant under section 73(3) proviso for which he prayed to set aside the order passed by the Commissioner (Appeals). 4. In response to such submissions, Learned Authorise....

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....n net working for the Banks. Further, as can be observed in the OIA, the Learned Commissioner (Appeals) put the services in the 'transfer of information and data processing' which is included in the Banking and Financial service' definition. The allegation against appellant in the show cause is found to be use of service of transmission of financial and other related messages. In common parlance, "transfer of data" and "transmission of messages" could be different from each other but as SWIFT charges has been held to be taxable in the above referred judgements, judicial precedent dictates that the same principal is to be respected for all times to come unless over-ruled by a larger Bench or Appellate Forum. Therefore, taxability on SWIFT ch....