Input tax credit eligibility requires prescribed statutory conditions to be proved by the claimant through invoices, supplier-payment evidence, transport or goods-receipt records, and supplier ledgers; absent proof, credit may be denied with consequential interest. Where a supplier remains unpaid beyond 180 days, the recipient must add the corresponding credit to output tax liability with interest, while retaining the right to re-avail it after payment. Non-operation of FORM GSTR-2 does not remove this liability because reversal through FORM GSTR-3B and voluntary payment mechanisms remain available. Private payment arrangements cannot extend the statutory period. Integrated-tax penalties aggregate corresponding central and state GST penalties, subject to the statutory minimum.

Section 76 of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 applies to every person who collects an amount as tax but does not pay it to the Government, including registered suppliers collecting GST under valid invoices. The provision does not distinguish between registered and unregistered persons or confine its scope to unauthorised tax collections. GST collected from recipients is held for the public exchequer, and its retention after filing nil or no returns attracts a penalty equivalent to the amount collected.

Section 76 applies where any person, including a registered supplier, collects an amount as GST from recipients and fails to remit it to the Government, whether or not the underlying supplies are taxable. The terms "every person" and "any amount" extend the provision to registered and unregistered collectors alike. Collected GST is held for the State, so its retention triggers remittance and equivalent-penalty consequences. Recovery mechanisms for unpaid tax do not displace Section 76 where collected GST remains unremitted.

Composition-levy eligibility under the CGST framework requires an opting registered person to furnish Form GST ITC-03 containing stock details and input tax credit reversal. Where the form is filed belatedly, the delayed compliance and the taxpayer's reply require consideration before eligibility is determined. Refusal of composition treatment without accounting for subsequently furnished Form GST ITC-03 requires fresh determination after considering the reply and compliance.

Rule 86A blocking of electronic input tax credit carries serious civil consequences and requires an effective pre-decisional hearing consistent with natural justice. A three-day notice was insufficient to permit production and substantiation of transaction records and supporting documents. The blocking order and consequential actions were quashed, credit was directed to be unblocked, and any fresh action under Rule 86A must follow an appropriate prior opportunity.

A corporate debtor sold as a going concern in liquidation retains its liabilities, including GST liabilities incurred during the insolvency resolution process. The resolution-plan mechanism under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code is distinct from liquidation and sale as a going concern. Liquidation regulations provide for identifying and grouping assets and liabilities for such a sale, under which the corporate debtor continues as an entity rather than merely having its assets sold separately. The insolvency moratorium does not dispense with statutory obligations arising during the resolution process, and approval of the sale did not separately adjudicate extinguishment of those liabilities.

GST portal uploads are a statutorily valid mode of service, but repeated non-response requires the proper officer to consider other available modes under the CGST Act, preferably registered post with acknowledgement due. Exclusive reliance on portal uploads in such circumstances may reduce service to an empty formality, particularly where the taxpayer receives no meaningful opportunity of hearing. Failure to take reasonable steps to ensure effective service breaches principles of natural justice and vitiates an ex parte assessment and consequent appellate rejection.

Section 75(7) of the Uttar Pradesh Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 restricts an adjudicating authority to confirming only the tax demand proposed in the show-cause notice. Where an adjudication order confirms tax, interest, or penalty exceeding the amounts proposed, the excess confirmation breaches this mandatory limitation and is jurisdictionally invalid. The permissible scope of adjudication is confined to the demand specified in the notice, and no enhanced liability may be confirmed beyond it.

Omission of Rule 96(10) of the Central Goods and Services Tax Rules, 2017, without a saving or sunset clause removes its restriction from pending claims for refund of integrated tax paid on exports. Section 6 of the General Clauses Act, 1897 does not preserve proceedings or liabilities arising solely under an omitted rule. A recommendation that the omission operate prospectively is advisory and cannot continue the omitted restriction. Pending export refund applications must therefore be reconsidered afresh under the applicable law, unaffected by earlier orders applying Rule 96(10).

Regular bail in allegations of fraudulent input tax credit availment and GST evasion requires assessment of the accusation, punishment, risks of evidence or witness tampering and abscondence, and public interest. Where the statutory period has expired, no recovery or discovery remains, the offence carries a limited maximum sentence and is triable by a Magistrate, continuing investigation alone need not justify custody. Stringent conditions can address concerns regarding electronic evidence and attendance. Personal liberty, bail as the norm, and avoidance of pre-trial punishment support release where trial is likely to take time, while conditions protect the investigation and trial.

Redetermination of GST tax, interest and penalty after rejection of proceedings under Section 74 requires independent, non-mechanical adjudication. Input Tax Credit cannot be denied solely because suppliers failed to deposit tax where invoices, transport and transaction records, banking-channel payments, and the absence of established purchaser fraud or collusion are material. The proper officer must consider the applicable statutory framework and purchaser evidence, hear the parties, and issue a reasoned speaking order. Appellate findings favourable to the purchaser remain undisturbed, and the adjudication is to be completed within four months.

Delay in filing a statutory GST appeal was condoned because the sole proprietor's cancer illness was supported by medical certificates. The medical evidence provided a sufficient basis for condonation, and adjudication on merits was preferred over barring the appeal on limitation. The appeal was restored for a merits decision, subject to deposit of costs.

Composition permission under the Gujarat Value Added Tax framework is conditional on compliance with prescribed scheme requirements. Rule 28C(6) bars a composition dealer from purchasing eatables or raw materials through inter-State trade or commerce, and Rule 28C(7) permits cancellation for breach. Cancellation was unsustainable where ledger entries showed funds received from an adjoining hotel business and paid to its supplier, no sugar purchase was debited to the dealer, and no evidence established that the dealer made the inter-State purchases.

Mere selection, grouping, branding and packing of bought-out LPG/CNG conversion components as a vehicle-specific kit does not constitute manufacture where the components retain their individual identity and undergo no processing or transformation. Manufacture requires both transformation into a distinct article with a new name, character or use and marketability; commercial identity or marketability of the kit alone is insufficient. Consequently, no excise duty arises from such non-transformative packing activity. Where the company incurs no excise-duty liability, a related employee penalty under Rule 26 of the Central Excise Rules, 2002 is unsustainable and must be set aside.

Waste and scrap arising from manufacture of goods under headings 8601 to 8606 cleared at a concessional duty rate falls within the exemption for such scrap, because the relevant entry does not limit relief to wholly exempt or nil-rated finished goods. An incorrect claim under a different notification does not displace an independently available exemption. The extended limitation period requires particularised fraud, wilful suppression, or intent to evade duty; departmental knowledge of the material facts and a bona fide notification-interpretation dispute defeat its invocation. Consequently, the duty paid is refundable, and no duty demand, consequential interest, or penalty survives.

Rule 6(3) permits a manufacturer that does not maintain separate accounts to choose the prescribed payment method or proportionate CENVAT-credit reversal. Rule 6(3A) requires written intimation of the date from which the proportionate-reversal option is exercised. Neither the Rules deem an election on the first day of a financial year nor treat continued payments under an earlier regime as an election of the payment option. Withdrawal restrictions apply only after actual exercise of an option; therefore, the proportionate-reversal option may be exercised during the financial year where no prior act of election occurred.

Foreign CRS/GDS services used to disseminate real-time flight availability and facilitate travel-agent ticket bookings did not fall within online information and database access or retrieval services. That classification required the foreign provider to supply data or information to the recipient, whereas the arrangements principally promoted and increased bookings and consideration depended on successful bookings. Booking information already existed in the airline's records and was automatically updated; it was not provider-owned data supplied to the airline. Incidental data flow could not alter the service's essential character. Receipt of the services therefore did not trigger reverse-charge service-tax liability.

Landowner receipts under a joint development arrangement were attributable to the sale of residential flats rather than consideration for a taxable transfer of development rights. Transactions concerning land and benefits arising from land fall outside the definition of service under the Finance Act, 1994. Where development rights are inseparable from the land and the parties jointly develop and sell flats, the arrangement does not create a distinct taxable supply of development rights to the developer. Consequently, the landowner's agreed share of sale proceeds was treated as proceeds from immovable property, with no service tax or penalty payable.

Road carriers qualify as goods transport agencies only when they both provide transport of goods by road and issue consignment notes. Road transport is otherwise within the negative list, except for services rendered by a goods transport agency or courier agency. Carriers that do not issue consignment notes therefore fall outside the definition of goods transport agency and are not liable to service tax on those road-transport services.

Reverse-charge service tax could not be levied on management consultancy services received from abroad where the service was rendered before 18 April 2006, when Section 66A became effective. The applicable legal position excluded reverse-charge liability for the pre-effective period. Consequently, no service tax was payable under reverse charge on the March 2006 service, and the confirmed demand was unsustainable.