Adjudicating authority seeks to include the value of free supplied materials received by the appellant in the gross value of the services rendered by the appellant. It is seen that after inclusion of gross value, the adjudicating authority has not given the benefit of Notification No. 15/2004, dated 10/09/2004 in the form of abatement of 67%.
Appellant is not entitled to claim CENVAT credit on the GTA service used by them for transportation of their final product from the place of removal for any period after 31/3/2008:
It was held that till the decision in the case of ITC Ltd., all the decisions were in favour of the respondents and therefore invoking suppression or mis-declaration etc. for confirmation of demand is not in order. Further, I also take note of the submission made by the ld. Counsel that even the original adjudicating authority has taken a view that the failure on the part of the assessee is acceptable as a bona fide error and cannot be attributed to be wilful intention to evade tax. In view of the above discussion, appeal fails on the ground of limitation alone and I am not going into merits since appeal can be rejected only on this ground. Appeal filed by the Revenue as well as the Cross-objection filed by the respondent get disposed of.
On a perusal of the definition of ‘Business Auxiliary Service’ as it stood during the material period, we are of the prima facie view that the appellant was functioning as a commission agent for AAI by collecting PSF for AAI and remitting the collections to them. It is not in dispute that the collection charges at the rate of 2.5% on PSF
The appellant/assessee herein filed a refund application with the authorities on the ground that the service tax paid by them should not have been paid. The adjudicating authority after following the Principles of natural justice, rejected the refund claim on various grounds, including the ground of unjust enrichment.
Issue before us involved in the current case is regarding the contract of supply, erection, installation and commissioning of fire, hydraulic systems and the issue before us in the case of the appellants own case in Final Order dt. 22/7/2010 was for supply, erection, installation and commissioning of power systems and distribution systems.
The short question to be considered in this appeal filed by the department is whether the view taken by the lower appellate authority that the respondent is eligible for CENVAT credit on outdoor catering service used for serving food to their employees during the period of dispute (July to December 2007) is correct or not. After hearing both sides, the learned Deputy Commissioner (AR) representing the appellant submits that the benefit is not admissible to the respondent unless they prove that no part of the cost of providing the service was recovered from their employees.
Short question which has to be considered in this case is whether the respondent is entitled to claim CENVAT credit of service tax paid by themselves on GTA service which was used for transportation of their final product from factory to the port for export. The respondent recovered FOB value from the foreign buyer, implying that the ownership of the goods vested in the respondent upto the place and time of loading of the goods into the ship. If the appellant had duty liability, they would have paid it on an assessable value including the freight. On these facts, it can be held that the place of removal of the goods was the port of export. The definition of ‘input service’ under rule 2(l) of the CENVAT Credit Rules, 2004 will squarely cover the above service which was used by the respondent for transportation of the goods from the factory to the place of removal.
The issue involved in the matter is whether the trade discount amounts received by the appellant to be treated as commission and taxable under the Business Auxiliary Service or not. The liability in that regard is essentially to be decided on the basis of the provisions of law comprised under the service tax statute. Besides the provisions of the said rules which are brought to our notice rather than disclosing principal to principal relationship between the publisher of the newspaper and the appellants, overall reading of the said rules disclose certain disciplinary control by the Newspaper Society over the appellants as far as it relates to advertising services are concerned which would, prima-facie, disclose the trade discount to be in the nature of commission to the agents.
Explanation to Rule 6(1) of the Service Tax Rules provide that for removal of doubt, it is clarified that in case the value of taxable service is received before providing of the said service, then the service tax is required to be paid on the value of the service, then the service tax is required to be paid on the value of the service attributable for the relevant month or quarter as the case may be. Ld. Chartered Accountant for the appellants has also drawn our attention to the fact that the said explanation ceased to be on the statute book from 12 th September, 2007.
