Malaysia Airlines Berhad Vs Commissioner of Delhi Goods And Services Tax Department of Trade And Taxes & Anr. (Delhi High Court)
Mismatch between GST returns & credit entries in bank account – HC set-aside order for Inadequate Reasoning
In the case of Malaysia Airlines Berhad Vs Commissioner of Delhi Goods and Services Tax Department of Trade and Taxes & Anr., the Delhi High Court reviewed an order dated April 27, 2024, which imposed a significant GST demand on the petitioner. The dispute centered around a mismatch between GST returns and credit entries in the petitioner’s bank account for the tax period from April 2018 to March 2019.
The order, issued under Section 73 of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017, followed a Show Cause Notice (SCN) based on a Special Audit Report. The SCN raised a demand of ₹163,91,65,902 for Integrated Tax, Central Tax, and State Tax, along with interest and penalties. The petitioner contended that the SCN did not adequately address their detailed responses to the Special Audit Report and did not propose a retrospective cancellation.
The core issue was a reported discrepancy of ₹815,19,62,101 between the petitioner’s GST returns and bank receipts. The petitioner argued that the demand was based on flawed assumptions, given their practice of using a single bank account for all GST registrations across India. They claimed that the SCN failed to properly consider this operational structure.
