Pyramid E Services Pvt. Ltd. Vs Commissioner of Central Excise (CESTAT Chandigarh)
The appeal was filed against the order dated 10.02.2023 passed by the Commissioner (Appeals), CGST, Chandigarh, which had rejected the appellant’s appeal and upheld the Order-in-Original confirming the demand of service tax along with interest and penalty.
The appellant was engaged in rendering services to overseas educational universities and colleges for facilitating admissions of prospective students. According to the appellant, the services were provided exclusively to foreign universities, consideration was received only from those universities in foreign exchange, and no payment was received from students in India. The Revenue, however, viewed the appellant as providing intermediary services to the foreign universities and issued a show cause notice dated 05.12.2017, culminating in confirmation of the service tax demand.
Before the Tribunal, the appellant submitted that it was an exporter of services and was not liable to service tax because the recipient of the services was located outside India. It contended that the consideration for educational services was directly credited by the overseas universities, establishing that the recipient and the benefit of the services were outside India. The appellant relied upon Rule 6A of the Service Tax Rules, 1994, asserting that all prescribed conditions for export of service were fulfilled. It further argued that service tax is a destination-based tax and that the issue had already been settled by the Tribunal in M/s Sunrise Immigration Consultants Private Limited vs. CCE & ST, Chandigarh, wherein referral services for foreign universities were held to constitute export of service and not intermediary services.
