Delay in present case has occurred not account of any substantial and sufficient reasons but on account of negligence of the appellant. If such delays are condoned, the meaning of limitation of thee months provided by legislature in the Central Excise Act would become meaningless and redundant.
Installing projects of high technical equipment is nothing but Modernisation of a factory and as per Cenvat credit Rules, 2004, services used in relation to modernisation are eligible for Cenvat credit.
From a perusal of Rule 8 of the Cenvat Credit Rules, 2002 , it will be seen that the same is applicable in three circumstances – (1) when the manufacturer of the final products shifts his factory to another site, (2) the factory is transferred from the existing owner to the another person on account of change of ownership, and (3) the factory is transferred on account of merger, amalgamation, lease or transfer of the factory to a joint venture with specific provision for transfer of liabilities of such factory.
In this case of specific rate of duty, prima facie, the ‘ place of removal’ would be the ‘ place of removal’ for the purpose of Rule 4 of Central Excise Rules, i.e. the places on removal from where the duty is liable to be paid, which in this case, is the factory gate of Sonadih factory, as the duty on clinker becomes payable at the time of removal from Sonadih factory.
Appellant have already paid service tax from their Modvat credit, the deposit of the service tax collected from the buyers would amount to double payment. It may be noted that the proceedings are for confirmation of demand in terms of section 73A of the Finance Act which relates to the tax collected by an assessee from the buyers, which is not required to be collected.
Question whether the place where goods are stored after clearance from the factory on payment of duty can be considered as place of removal for the purpose of Rule 2(l) of Cenvat Credit Rules, 2004 is no longer res integra because of the clarification issued by the CBEC in the matter.
I do not agree with the argument that the time-limit under Notification dated 1-3-2011 cannot be made applicable to the claims filed before that date and pending on that date. I also consider the fact that even under the earlier notification, the Deputy Commissioner had power to condone the delay. The delay involved was only 17 days and when a public authority is given any power, he is expected to exercise it unless there is a reason for not exercising such power.
No doubt, mere submission of document shall not ipso facto grant relief to claimant. But once the facts and circumstances of the case bring out the identity of the receipient of service, denial of cenvat credit may cause absurdity and when claim is otherwise permissible. Added to this, the claimant appellant should not make multiple claim using same document in different locations to avail cenvat credit and ensure that no jeopardy is caused to Revenue. But such an allegation of multiple claim is absent in the present case.
Prima facie, liability to pay service tax arises with reference to the place where service was provided rather than the place where consideration was collected
The applicant were discharging their Service Tax liability in respect of tuition fee being charged by them from their students. Their premises were visited by the officers on 7.1.2010 and scrutiny of various records maintained by the appellants revealed that no Service Tax was being paid by them on pre-schooling coaching, sale of text books, conducting of mock test series etc.
