2022 (8) TMI 591

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.... Petitioner in the Appeal as illegal, improper and incorrect and violative of Article 14 and 19(1)(g) of the Constitution of India and consequently to direct Respondent No. 2 to grant refund to the Petitioner. 3. The facts are as under: i. The Petitioner is a Company registered under Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 ['C.G.S.T. Act'] read with Andhra Pradesh Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 ['A.P.G.S.T. Act'] within the State of Andhra Pradesh.   ii. The Petitioner is primarily engaged in business of providing Express Courier Services to Units situated in Special Economic Zone ['SEZ']. The period in dispute is between April, 2018 to July, 2018 and August, 2018 to March, 2019. The Petitioner made supplies to SEZ Unit, which are to be treated as zero rated supplies and, as such, the Petitioner is entitled for refund of input taxes paid, while making zero rated supply, in view of Section 16 of Integrated Goods and Service Tax, 2017, ['I.G.S.T. Act']. iii. An application for refund came to be made under Section 54 of C.G.S.T Act read with Rule 89 of Central Goods and Service Tax Rules, 2017 ['C.G.S.T. Rules']. The said application has to be mad....

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....on/reply made by the Petitioner, the Authorities rejected the claim of Rs.3,45,02,753/- [Rs.86,27,371/- in W.P. No. 2478 of 2022] on the ground of non-submission of endorsement certificate. Challenging the same, the Petitioner filed an Appeal No. 3/2021, dated 05.01.2021, [Appeal No. 04/2021, dated 29.01.2021] before Respondent No. 1 in terms of Section 107 of the C.G.S.T. Act. In the said Appeals, the Petitioner explained the difficulty faced in obtaining the endorsement certificate and requested Respondent No. 1 to set-aside the refund rejection order. vii. Pending Appeals, the Petitioner requested the Development Commissioner of SEZ to help in obtaining endorsement certificates. Finally, the Petitioner was able to obtain endorsement certificate, dated 11.01.2021, from the specified officer of Ramky Pharmacity India Limited, for a substantial portion of the services provided to SEZ Units for authorized operations. On receipt of the said certificate, the Petitioner submitted the same to Respondent No. 1 by way of additional material on 10.02.2021. The Petitioner attended the hearing on 13.07.2021 through its consultants, wherein, the grounds mentioned earlier, were reiter....

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...., inaction or lack of bona fides cannot be imputed to the party concerned. He relied on the Judgment of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Madanlal V. Shyamlal (2002) 1 SCC 535 in support of his plea. (ii) Sri. Karan Talwar, learned Counsel appearing for the Petitioner, further submits that the Order impugned in the Writ Petitions is in violation of principles of natural justice and violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India. According to him, the endorsement certificate could not be filed along with the refund application, as the Petitioner could not secure the same by then and after causing due diligence, he could secure the certificate pending appeal and, as such, filed those certificate in appeal. Therefore, the reason given for not filing the endorsement certificate along with the refund application within the time prescribed cannot be brushed aside, more so, when the statue provides that the Petitioner is entitled for refund under Section 24, and Rule 112 prescribe filing of application even in appeal. (iii) In view of the above and having regard to the finding given by the Appellate Authority that accepting document at a belated stage is the discretion of the autho....

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....om Ramky Pharmacity India Limited. Therefore, it cannot be said that the Petitioner kept quiet without pursuing its remedies. 10. Insofar as the plea of the Respondents that the Petitioner ought to have obtained endorsement certificate much prior to arrival of Covid in India, it is to be noted here that the Petitioner herein has two years time to claim refund and the Petitioner could not have anticipated that the pandemic will sweep the entire country during that period. Therefore, non obtaining endorsement certificate prior to Covid pandemic cannot be a ground to reject the claim. As stated earlier, the Petitioner could not have anticipated the situation and when it thought of making an application within the time prescribed, the entire country was engulfed with pandemic. Therefore, as contended by the Petitioner, its efforts to obtain endorsement certificate within the time prescribed, proved futile, cannot be brushed aside. 11. Coming to acceptance of additional evidence pending appeal, it would be just and proper to extract Rule 112 of the C.G.S.T. Rules, which reads as under: "112. Production of Additional Evidence before the Appellate Authority or the Appellate....

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....ng Officer, but the same was not accepted on the ground that the letters were signed by the Managing Director of the Assessee-Company. Therefore, when in the proceedings of appeal, the confirmation letters of the parties were produced with explanation for not producing the same, there was no reason for the assessing officer to reject the same. 17. Fresh confirmation letters were only in continuation of previous ones already produced. They were produced only in compliance of requirement on which the Assessing Officer based his rejection. They were, as such, not new evidence. The refusal to permit them was mechanical and suffered from non application of mind. The assessee's case for permission to produce such additional evidence clearly fell under clause (b) of sub Rule (1) of 46A that he was prevented by sufficient cause from producing the confirmation letters, which he was called upon to produce by the Assessing Officer. Those confirmation letters were in support of the ground of assessee's appeal, therefore, it was covered under sub-clause (c) also." 13. Further, Rule 112(4) of C.G.S.T. Rules postulate that, nothing contained in the said Rule shall affect the p....