Tvl. Jeyalakhsmi Store Vs Commissioner of Commercial Taxes (Madras High Court)
The case before the Madras High Court concerned a writ petition challenging the cancellation of GST registration of a proprietor for failure to file returns. The petitioner received a show cause notice dated 04.01.2021 proposing cancellation under Section 29(2)(c) of the CGST Act due to non-filing of returns for a continuous period of six months. The petitioner submitted that during the COVID-19 pandemic and nationwide lockdown, business operations had ceased, and returns were not filed as the accountant handling GST compliance was not contacted.
The registration was cancelled by order dated 25.01.2021. The petitioner became aware of the cancellation only in May 2022 when the accountant accessed the GST portal. Subsequently, pending returns up to August 2022 were filed, mostly as nil returns due to lack of business activity. The petitioner attempted to seek revocation of cancellation, but the request was rejected as it was not filed within the prescribed limitation period of 90 days.
The petitioner relied on administrative instructions issued by the Principal Secretary/Commissioner of Commercial Taxes dated 07.04.2022, which directed exclusion of the period from 15.03.2020 to 28.02.2022 for computing limitation, in line with orders of the Supreme Court. The petitioner also cited earlier decisions of the Court where delay was condoned under similar circumstances.
