Goods and Services Tax Appellate Tribunal (GSTAT)

GST was introduced in India with the main objective of One Tax One Nation, lower legal compliances and reduction in litigations, no check posts and transparency in tax structure etc. However, we all have witnessed how in haste the historic indirect tax regime has been implemented in India, thus teething problems are inevitable. Those teething worries are seen in the form of technical glitches, numerous notifications, circulars, press release and excessive litigation. It has just been 2 years since, GST has been implemented in India and till now countless Advance Rulings, appeal against such advance rulings and writs have been filed in High Courts. Till now various cases pertaining to E-way Bill has been filed before the first appellate authority in terms of section 107 of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 (hereinafter referred as CGST Act, 2017). Orders have also been passed by the first appellate authority which are further subject to appeal either by the taxpayer or the government before the Appellate Tribunal. However, Appellate Tribunals were not constituted, for which notification has been issued by the Ministry of Finance on 21^st August 2019. For the sake of such constitution of benches of Appellate Tribunals, Orders passed under section 107 of CGST Act were pending to be appealed for seeking relief either by the taxpayer or the department. Vide Notification No. S.O. 3009(E) dated August 21^st August, 2019, State Benches and Area Benches have been notified as under:

State and Union Territory Bench

 The following Area Benches have also been notified:

However, it is pertinent to note that Benches for Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh is yet to be notified. Taxpayers and Department are eagerly waiting for commencement of operations of GSTAT.