2025 (12) TMI 1459

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....essment passed under the provisions of the Tamil Nadu Value Added Tax Act, 2006 ('Act'), dated 11.02.2015, qua assessment year 2013 -14. The writ petition come to be dismissed relegating the appellant to statutory remedy by way of appeal. 2. We have heard Ms.Aparna, who appears for the appellant. Prior to completion of assessment, the authority had issued notice dated 07.11.2014 calling for an explanation in regard to a claim of Input Tax Credit (ITC) availed under invoice dated 10th March, 2014. The officer refers therein to the fact that the registration of the selling dealer had been cancelled as on 21.02.2014. 3. The appellant submitted objections to the effect that though the effective date of cancellation of the registration was....

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....e unavailable to the assessee at the relevant point in time. 8. We heard both the learned counsel and perused the material papers as well as the cases relied upon. 9. We are called upon to examine whether the order of assessment dated 11.02.2015 is contrary to the provisions of natural justice, proceeding on a premise that had not been put to the assessee in the show cause notice. For this purpose, we turn to show cause notice dated 07.11.2014. The assessing authority has verified the monthly return for the month of March, 2014 and noticed that the dealer had made a purchase from one Ocean Impex, whose registration had been cancelled on 21.02.2014. 10.The proposal of the officer is to reverse the claim of ITC on the premise that sa....

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....preferring a statutory appeal is the Rule and no justifiable reason had been given to treat this matter as an exception. The appellant had hence been relegated to statutory appeal. 14. In Ecom Gill (supra),the Supreme Court has considered the scope of Section 70 of the Karnataka Value Added Tax Act, 2023 relating to 'Burden of Proof' which is in parimeteria with Section 70 of the TNVAT and holds at paragraph 23, as follows:- '23. Thus, the provisions of Section 70, quoted hereinabove, in its plain terms clearly stipulate that the burden of proving that the ITC claim is correct lies upon the purchasing dealer claiming such ITC. Burden of proof that the ITC claim is correct is squarely upon the assessee who has to discharge the sa....

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....id to be proving the burden as per section 70 of the Act, 2003.' 15. The Court has held that mere proving of invoices or payments through challans would not suffice as far as proving the burden under Section 70 is concerned. The question of proving the transaction, including movement of goods, thus rests on the dealer concerned and is mandatorily to be discharged in order to sustain a claim of ITC. 16. This Court in Sahyadri Industries Limited (supra) has also taken a similar view, relegating those assessee's to statutory appeal in similar / identical circumstances. 17. In this case, admittedly, no records have been produced before the authority, including any documents to establish actual movement of the goods. The query under pre....