TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2024 (7) TMI 478
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....oned refund of Rs.43,00,599/- and rejected the balance amount of Rs.32,09,273/-. Aggrieved against the rejection of the part of the refund claim, the appellant preferred appeals before Commissioner (Appeals) who vide the common impugned order rejected the appeals. Hence these appeals. 3. Shri Raghav Rajeev, learned counsel appeared on behalf of the appellant and Shri Anoop Singh, learned Authorize Representative appeared for the respondent-department. 3.1 The learned counsel for the appellant submitted a chart of the disputed refund amount as under; Break-up Issue wise Service Tax Appeal Nos. Rs. S. No. Issues 42721 / 2014 42722 / 2014 42723 / 2014 42724 / 2014 42725 / 2014 42726 / 2014 Total 1. Services wholly consumed in SEZ 9,30,811 7,23,020 68,454 5,16,405 60,853 4,25,945 27,25,488 2. Xerox copy of invoices produced at the time of filing of refund claim* 28,066 40,137 54,122 1,02,824 29,106 68,861 3,23,116 3. Alleged non- production of invoices at the time of filing of refund claim* 413 46 13,188 1,199 10,691 - 25,537 4. Service received in ....
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.... are only procedural in nature. Furthermore, there is no dispute on receipt of service for authorised operation as the list of input services along with payment of Service Tax and invoice details submitted by the Appellant is not disputed. Thus, the refund claim of the Appellant cannot be denied on such procedural/technical grounds. The Impugned Orders has travelled beyond the scope of SCN to deny refund on the ground of exchange rate fluctuation as there is no such allegation in the SCN. Further, as per the conditions prescribed in Notifications (Paragraph 2(d)(f) of Notification No. 40/2012-ST dated 20.06.2012), the Appellant is eligible to claim refund of the service tax which they have paid to the service provider. The Appellant submits that services were availed for reconditioning the damaged import container which is utilised for unloading raw materials within the SEZ used for authorised operations. However refund was denied on the ground that such service is a non-SEZ activity. The Ld Counsel has submitted that such activity falls within scope of commercial or industrial construction service approved by MPEZ. Thus, rejection of refund is unsustainable. He hence prayed that t....
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.... that as per the Exemption Notification, invoice should be in the name and address of the assessee, who is claiming the refund and not in the name of its Corporate Office. I feel that substantive justice must not be denied on procedural grounds. The department could have verified the proper use / receipt of the input services by the appellant. Trade facilitation involves taking such an extra step. In case dual use of invoice or non-provision any service was detected, or the appellant was not able to discharge the burden of proof regarding the admissibility of the CENVAT credit, then a reasoned decision could have been taken to deny the credit. Merely rejecting a valid invoice since it is addressed to the corporate office was not warranted. Further there is no allegation that the input services were not received or utilised by the Appellant. In absence of any such dispute, denial of refund solely on ground that the Invoice is in the name of Corporate Office is unjustified and is set aside. Rejection of refund due to no signature, wrong date in invoice and no payment proof. 9. The appellant is aggrieved by the Department denying refund on ground that some of the invoices have n....
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....ollowed. The issue hence merits to be examined denovo with the appellant given one more opportunity to prove his case. Xerox copy of invoices produced at the time of filing of refund claim 10. It is the department's stand that the Exemption Notifications mandates submission of original invoices to be filed along with the refund claim. Since photocopies were filed the claims have been rejected. Rule 9(1) of the CENVAT Credit Rules, 2004 lists the documents on the basis of which CENVAT credit shall be taken by the manufacturer or the provider of output service or input service distributor. These documents are original documents, as they represent the best evidence of the payment of duty, in different circumstances and it also prevents a double claim of credit or refund. This can be done by defacement of the original document on the basis of which a refund claim has been settled. A photocopy or duplicate invoice carries the threat of misuse. However, if the original invoices are for any reason submitted at a subsequent stage from that of the date of filing of the claim, giving sufficient reason for the same, they should be processed as in the normal course. In the case of photoc....