Delay in filing a compensation application before the Claims Tribunal may be condoned where the claimant bona fide pursued a civil suit because the Tribunal had not existed when the accident occurred and its jurisdiction over pre-constitution accidents was unsettled. Time spent obtaining legal advice after dismissal of the civil suit may also constitute sufficient cause. Delay must be satisfactorily explained, but mathematical precision is not required. The compensation application should therefore be treated as filed within limitation.

IT Grievance Redressal Mechanism addresses common GST portal glitches affecting classes of taxpayers who could not timely file prescribed forms or returns despite bona fide compliance attempts. Taxpayers must submit evidence-based applications through field or nodal officers; GSTN verifies widespread issues and places solutions before the IT Grievance Redressal Committee. Verified glitches may support waiver of consequential fine and penalty. Identified taxpayers whose TRAN-1 filings remained incomplete due to failed digital authentication may complete filing without increasing the recorded credit amount, subject to the specified completion timelines.

India's commerce and industry engagement with Japan is structured around a business delegation visit to deepen bilateral trade, investment, technology and industrial collaboration. Sector-focused discussions cover semiconductors, artificial intelligence, start-ups, automotive manufacturing, steel, electronics, industrial and consumer markets. Business roadshows and investor interactions are directed at presenting opportunities in India's manufacturing, clean-energy and consumer sectors, while advancing cooperation in high-technology manufacturing and next-generation industries.

Operation Black Hawk targeted an alleged inter-state heroin trafficking network moving crude heroin from the North-East region towards Uttar Pradesh. Intelligence-led vehicle tracking and highway interceptions resulted in the seizure of over 18.6 kg of crude heroin and the arrest of three suspected network members under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985. The narcotics were detected in specially fabricated concealed compartments within a passenger vehicle fuel tank and a heavy commercial vehicle body frame. Both vehicles and the contraband were confiscated, while financial and logistical investigations continue into suppliers and distribution channels.

Speed money paid through sub-contractors to port workers for prompt cargo handling may qualify as allowable business expenditure where it is incurred in the ordinary course of clearing and forwarding operations to prevent demurrage and related losses. Trade practice and business necessity support deductibility when no material shows that the payments were bogus, inflated, or unrelated to business purposes. Deduction of tax at source and recipient accounting further support the business character of the payments. An estimated disallowance without a rational basis is not justified; the disallowance was deleted.

Unrecovered arrears of value added tax, entry tax, wrongly availed input tax credit and inadmissible transitional credit are recoverable as State tax arrears under the Gujarat GST framework. Principal tax liabilities may be paid from the electronic credit ledger or electronic cash ledger and must be recorded in Part II of FORM GST PMT-01. Related interest, penalty and late fee are payable only through the electronic cash ledger. Pre-GST returns may be filed and paid through the earlier online procedure, while unregistered persons remain subject to recovery and cash payment under the existing-law procedure.

In a multi-party appeal, non-substitution of legal representatives of a deceased respondent does not automatically abate the entire appeal. Continuation depends on whether the right to sue survives, the deceased party's estate is adequately represented by existing parties, the decree is joint and indivisible, and further proceedings could result in conflicting or inexecutable decrees. Co-owners who instituted proceedings concerning jointly owned land may represent the common estate, while non-contesting co-sharers may remain proper parties. A court must assess these factors before treating an appeal as wholly abated and should decide the merits if effective, non-conflicting adjudication remains possible.

Banking labour relations are affected by proposed nationwide industrial action over five-day banking, performance-linked incentives, and pension-related demands. Five-day banking remains pending despite a bipartite arrangement for extended weekday hours. Unions dispute an incentive scheme that differentiates awards by seniority and individual performance, contending that it departs from bank-level performance linkage and uniformity across cadres. They also allege that implementation during pending conciliation breaches a status quo obligation, while pension revision, uniform dearness allowance, and a pension-scheme switch option remain unresolved.

Priority Sector Lending Certificates, Renewable Energy Certificates and similar scrips are classified under heading 4907 and attract GST at 12%. The residual 18% rate applies only where goods are not covered by a specific GST rate-schedule entry. The earlier residual-rate clarification for Priority Sector Lending Certificates is modified. Duty credit scrips classifiable under heading 4907 attract Nil GST under the applicable exemption entry.

Free-of-cost moulds and dies supplied by an OEM to an unrelated component manufacturer are not a supply without consideration and do not require input tax credit reversal when provided in the course or furtherance of business. Their value is excluded from the component supply value unless the component manufacturer was contractually required to use its own moulds or dies; in that event, amortised cost is included and related credit must be reversed. Separately stated spare parts and labour in car servicing are taxable at their respective applicable rates.

India's free trade agreement strategy seeks to expand preferential market access and integrate the country into global value chains as a trusted trading partner. Negotiations with additional country groups and individual nations are intended to extend agreement coverage to a substantial share of global trade. Investment opportunities are identified in data centres, manufacturing and artificial intelligence, alongside an objective of developing more balanced trade relations between India and Japan.

Services of short-term accommodation, conferencing, banqueting and similar services supplied to an SEZ developer or unit are inter-State supplies, as the specific rule governing supplies to SEZs prevails over the general place-of-supply rule for immovable-property-related services. Zero-rated treatment and related refund claims require receipt of supplies by the SEZ for authorised operations, supported by prescribed evidence and endorsement. Textile fabric processors supplying job-work services may claim inverted-duty-structure refund because their output is a service, not a supply of fabrics.

Foreign exchange market conditions supported a modest early appreciation of the rupee against the US dollar due to relative dollar softness. The gain was limited by elevated crude oil prices, importer demand for dollars, and caution over anticipated sanctions affecting Iranian oil trade, banking networks and shipping routes. Currency markets remained sensitive to geopolitical uncertainty and possible wider trade effects.

Section 75(4) requires an opportunity of hearing where a taxable person seeks it in writing or an adverse GST decision is contemplated. The safeguard requires effective notice, proper service, reasonable time to reply and a meaningful chance to present submissions. Failure to provide hearing details, service through an inaccessible portal location, or notice at an incorrect registered email or address may breach natural justice. Conversely, the requirement may be satisfied where adequate hearing opportunities were provided and the taxpayer adopted the written defence as final submissions.

Consideration of a taxpayer's response to Form GST DRC-01A is integral to adjudication of alleged wrongful input tax credit under Section 74 of the CGST Act. Where invoices, e-way bills and bank statements support the genuineness of purchases and ITC, an authority cannot presume that no response was filed without evaluating that material. Section 75(4) requires a meaningful hearing where an adverse decision is contemplated. An ex parte demand based on an unexamined record may justify a fresh opportunity to produce documents and participate in hearing.

Statutory appeal is ordinarily the proper first forum for GST show-cause notice challenges, including alleged incomplete service, missing relied-upon documents and an incorrect tax period. Such objections remain available before the appellate authority and are not extinguished merely because writ relief is declined. The decisive enquiry is whether the taxpayer understood the allegations, had essential material, received a meaningful opportunity to respond and suffered actual prejudice. Taxpayers should raise defects promptly in writing, seek clarification or documents, participate under protest where necessary, and preserve records supporting non-supply and prejudice.

Tax computation under the Income-tax Act, 1961 is controlled by statutory provisions and the real-income principle, not merely by Ind AS or ICDS accounting entries. Notional income from discounting refundable security deposits, amortisation of royalty already taxed, or other temporal accounting allocations does not create taxable income without a real receipt or enforceable right to receive. Asset-related grants must follow the statutory actual-cost mechanism, while Ind AS-ICDS borrowing-cost differences are computational timing differences. A procedural delay in certification cannot defeat a substantive research-and-development deduction where underlying approval is undisputed.

Imported dry laser imagers that receive digital inputs from imaging systems and print them on film lack independent diagnostic capability and are accessories, not diagnostic instruments or apparatus. Under Chapter 90 Note 2, accessories are classified with particular machines only when suitable for use solely or principally with one machine type or machines under the same tariff heading. Where laser imagers are compatible with medical imaging apparatus under different tariff headings, they fall under the residual heading for unspecified parts and accessories of Chapter 90.

Input tax credit on telecommunication towers under section 17(5)(d) requires a prior factual determination of whether a particular tower is movable or immovable property. Exclusion of towers from "plant and machinery" does not itself establish immovability. The inquiry considers annexation, intention, permanence, functionality, dismantlability, relocation, reassembly, and marketability. Only after an asset is found immovable can the blocked-credit provision be applied. The retrospective alignment of statutory terminology does not displace this threshold enquiry. Technical evidence of the tower's design, installation, dismantling, and relocation remains material to any credit claim or denial.

GST on a DBFOT road concession may arise where toll-collection rights granted to a concessionaire are non-monetary, deferred consideration for highway-construction services. The arrangement may constitute barter, requiring valuation where consideration is not wholly in money. The subcontractor's construction supply to the concessionaire remains distinct from the concessionaire's supply to NHAI. Although road access on payment of toll is exempt, toll rights received as reciprocal or annuity-like consideration for construction form taxable consideration and fall outside that exemption.