Agarwal Aromas Private Limited Vs Union of India And 3 Others (Allahabad High Court)
The petitioner challenged the inability to file a statutory appeal under Section 107 of the UPGST Act against an adjudication order dated 30.05.2025 passed under Section 74. The central grievance was that although the petitioner had deposited the disputed tax amount before the passing of the impugned order—solely to limit the dispute arising from the show cause notice—the petitioner had consistently objected to the proposed tax, interest, and penalty. According to the petitioner, this prior deposit could not extinguish its statutory right to appeal.
The difficulty arose because the GSTN-managed online portal did not permit the filing of the appeal. When attempting to file, the system displayed “disputed amount cannot be zero,” as the portal automatically retrieved “Nil” in the column for disputed tax from the adjudication order. As a result, the appeal could not be filed through the mandatory online mode.
On 14.10.2025, the Court noted this issue and also flagged a recurring problem where dates of personal hearings were being scheduled on the portal prior to the dates fixed for filing replies. The Court observed that software logic could easily prevent such errors by restricting the personal hearing date from being set before the reply due date, and directed GSTN to consider appropriate modifications.
