TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2025 (8) TMI 74
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....appellant but appropriated an amount of Rs. 27,86,192/- paid by them towards service tax dues, confirmed the demand of Rs. 13,32,867/-, the amount of service tax short paid for the period 2011- 12 and also imposed penalty of Rs. 6,66,434/- on the appellant. 2. The facts of the case, in brief, are that the appellant/ assessee filed a declaration in form VCES-1 under Service Tax Voluntary Compliance Encouragement Scheme-2013 and had declared therein a sum of Rs 27,86,192 /- as 'Service Tax dues' in column No. 6 of VCES-1, and had also enclosed calculation sheet. The appellant had also enclosed statement of service tax payable for the month of 2009-2010 to 2012-2013. While examining the VCES declaration filed by the appellant, it appeared t....
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....ent of service tax. As the appellant suppressed the material facts, hence, service tax so evaded is recoverable from the appellant alongwith interest. Accordingly, Show Cause Notice dated 16.12.2014 was issued to the appellant proposing to reject the VCES and demand the amount of service tax of Rs. 13,32,867/- alongwith interest and proposing to impose penalty of Rs. 41,19,059/- and to appropriate an amount of Rs. 9,01,728/- already paid by the appellant. 2.1 The learned Principal Commissioner, after allowing personal hearing and perusal of the written submission filed by the appellant vide letter dated 09.01.2015, came to the conclusion that the declaration filed by the appellant-assessee declaring tax dues is only for the years 2009-10....
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....ce Act, 1994. Feeling aggrieved from the impugned order as mentioned above, the appellant filed the present appeal before this Tribunal. 3. Learned Counsel for the appellant submitted that the whole demand is hit by the bar of limitation. The show cause notice was issued on 16.12.2014 and was served to the appellant through a Panchnama drawn on 16.12.2014 in late hours of evening when the appellant's office was closed. The appellant received the same on 17.12.2014 which is beyond one year from the date of declaration i.e. 06.12.20213 hence, it is hit by the bar of limitation as per Section 111(2) of the Finance Act, 2013. 3.1 Learned Counsel for the appellant also submitted that the main allegation of the department was that the appel....
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....Commissioner has stated that inquiry against the appellant was initiated on 22.10.2013 by the DGCEI and the appellant filed their declaration under VCEIC-I to the Service Tax Department on 06.12.2013. The DGCEI has detected the short payment of service tax by the appellant to the tune of Rs. 13,32,867/- for the year 2011-12 based on 26AS statement. The department also observed that for the Finance Year 2011-12, the appellant had filed ST-3 returns on 24.04.2011 and 26.12.2011 wherein they declared their service tax liability as Rs. 9,54,496/-. Therefore, the appellant according to the department, short declared their service tax liability for the year 2011-12 by amount of Rs. 3,78,371/- even in their ST-3 returns. The contention of the appe....
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....of fact with regard to their actual service tax liability for the year 2011-12. He prayed that the impugned order may be upheld and the appeal may be rejected. 5. I have heard the learned Counsel for the appellant and learned AR for the department and perused the record. 5.1 I am of the view that the arguments of the learned Counsel for the appellant appears to be without any force. The first contention of the learned Counsel for the appellant is that the show cause notice is time- barred because it was issued on 16.12.2014 and it was received by the appellant on 17.12.2014 whereas the date of declaration is 06.12.2013. Regarding this issue, the learned Principal Commissioner has stated in the impugned order at page 9 in para 24 that ....
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.... be said that demand is barred by limitation. 5.3 The learned Counsel for the appellant also argued that during investigation initiated by DGCEI, Vadodara, the appellant has paid up the remaining dues for the periods in question which comes to Rs. 13,88,252/- which is even more than the amount being shown in the notice as non- declared amount in VCES. 5.4 I do not agree with the learned Counsel for the appellant. The assessee was required to declare their true service tax liability for the period upto December 2012. However, from the perusal of work-sheet submitted by the DGCEI, Vadodara vide their letter dated 19.05.2014, it appeared that, while the total liability for the said period upto December 2012 worked out to an amount of Rs.....