TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2026 (3) TMI 1295
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....r suppression of material facts or misrepresentation of facts, shall render such ruling to be void ab initio in accordance with Section 104 of the Act. 5. The provisions of both the Central Goods and Services Tax Act and the Tamil Nadu Goods and Services Tax Act (herein referred to as the Act) are the same except for certain provisions. Therefore, unless a mention is specifically made to such dissimilar provisions, a reference to the Central Goods and Services Tax Act would also mean a reference to the same provisions under the Tamil Nadu Goods and Services Tax Act. M/s. GORANTLA GEOSYNTHETICS LTD., No. 3, First Floor, Saraswathi Street, Mahalingapuram, Kodambakkam, Chennai - 600 034. (hereinafter called as the "Applicant") are registered under the GST Act with GSTIN: 33AACCG6068M1ZC. The applicant is a service provider of Municipal Solid Waste Management Solutions. They are executing the project under Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban) 2.0 for "Reclamation of Existing Dump Yard located at Compost Yard by Removing the Legacy Waste in Ariyalur Municipality". 1.2 They are handling a total volume of 16,055 m3 of legacy waste, which includes excavation, screening, shredding and sci....
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....uling Authority held that such services are exempt (Ref. Order No. 35/AAR/2020, dated 21.10.2020). 3.4 Further, they also like to refer their own case wherein the Advance Ruling Authority held that such services are exempt for their project at Tumkur Municipal Corporation (Ref. Order No. 114/AAR/2023, dated 17.11.2023). 4. Interpretation of Law by the Applicant based on the statement of facts: 4.1 The applicant submits that the services provided by them which has predominant characteristics of Solid Waste Management and they will fall under SAC Code No. 9994 "Sewage and Waste Collection, treatment and disposal and other environmental Protection Services" and in particular Group 99943 - Waste treatment and disposal services as per Annexure to Notification No. 11/2017, Central Tax, dated 28.06.2017. 4.2 Ariyalur Municipality is under Government authority. For the purposes of this clause, the expression - "Government Authority" means an authority or a board or any other body (i) set up by an Act of Parliament or a State legislature; or (ii) established by any Government, with ninety per cent or more participation by way of equity or cont....
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....utions, and that they are executing the instant project under Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban) 2.0 for "Reclamation of Existing Dump Yard located at Compost Yard by Removing the Legacy Waste in Ariyalur Municipality". Under the instant project, they are reportedly handling a total volume of 16,055 m3 of legacy waste, which includes excavation, screening, shredding and scientific disposal in compliance with the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016 and CPCB Guidelines of 2019. For the execution of this project, they are deploying a comprehensive set of machinery such as trammel screens for segregation of waste, excavators and JCBs for excavation, loading and site operations, along with tippers and trucks for transportation of segregated materials. While the segregated waste streams are managed responsibly to ensure compliance with environmental standards, Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF) generated from the screening process is transported to cement plants and other authorized facilities for co-processing. Compost and soil fractions are tested in accredited laboratories before being reused or disposed of, while inerts and rejects are disposed of through scientific landfilling or other approved me....
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....ely borne by the Concessionaire at his/ her own cost. 10. Work Plan The proposed work involves selection and engagement of an interested and capable Private Entrepreneur for excavating the compact mixed garbage dumped over 20 years which underwent partial biological degradation, by using suitable Mechanical excavators, stabilizing the biodegradable wastes by insitu windrow composting and use of appropriate mechanical screens to sieve the excavated and processed materials into recoverable fractions such as recyclables (metal and glass), fine fraction (soil/ compost), coarse fractions (incinerables such as plastics, textile, tyre, rubber etc), inerts (stone, bricks, construction debris) and hazardous wastes (batteries, containers of toxic materials, tube lights etc) in the assigned land areas on Design, Build, Own and Operate (DBOO) concept so as to retrieve and recover materials by segregating, sorting, diverting for recycling the excavated materials and safe disposal of residues at approved disposal facilities. It will involve ---------." And the bidder/concessionaire is expected to hand over the cleared site back to the Ariyalur Municipality on comple....
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....s 999441 Site remediation and clean-up services 999442 Containment, control and monitoring services and other site remediation services 999443 Building remediation services 999449 Other remediation services nowhere else classified 7.7 As could be seen from the above, 'Site remediation' in the instant case gets covered under Group 99944, and more specifically under SAC 999441, as the applicant is assigned with the task of "Reclamation of Existing Dump Yard located at Compost Yard by Removing the Legacy Waste in Ariyalur Municipality". However, the objective of the project is not just land reclamation or 'Remediation Services', but also bio mining of waste, which involves processing of waste and disposal of the same as well. Therefore, this part of the operation gets covered under Group 99943, and more specifically under SAC 999432, which relates to Hazardous waste treatment and disposal services', and under SAC 999433 relating to Non-hazardous waste treatment and disposal services'. Accordingly, we are of the opinion that the entire operation undertaken by the applicant in this case gets covered broadly under h....
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....ed in clause (d) of article 243 of the Constitution; (b) a "Municipality" as defined in clause (e) of article 243P of the Constitution; (c) a Municipal Committee, a Zilla Parishad, a District Board, and any other authority legally entitled to, or entrusted by the Central Government or any State Government with the control or management of a municipal or local fund; (d) a Cantonment Board as defined in section 3 of the Cantonments Act, 2006; (e) a Regional Council or a District Council constituted under the Sixth Schedule to the Constitution; (f) a Development Board constituted under article 371 of the Constitution; or (g) a Regional Council constituted under article 371A of the Constitution; Accordingly, we find that the Ariyalur Municipality qualifies as a "local authority" under Section 2(69) of the CGST Act, 2017, and therefore the services are provided to a 'local authority' by the applicant in the instant case. 7.11 The next criterion to be verified is whether the activity is a function entrusted to the Municipality. In this regard, it is observed that the 12th Schedule to Article 243W of the Indian Constitution deals....