Abdul Kader M Vs State Tax Officer (Madras High Court)
The writ petition was decided by the Madras High Court and challenged the validity of Notification Nos. 09/2023 dated 31.03.2023 and 56/2023 dated 28.11.2023 issued under the GST law, as well as a consequential assessment order dated 30.07.2024. By consent of parties, the matter was taken up for final disposal at the admission stage.
At the hearing, both sides submitted that the issue regarding the validity of the impugned notifications had already been conclusively decided by a common order of the same Court dated 12.06.2025 in a batch of writ petitions. In that decision, the Court held that while tax authorities are entitled to exclusion of the period from 15.03.2020 to 28.02.2022 for computing limitation under Section 73 of the CGST Act pursuant to orders of the Supreme Court under Article 142, Notification Nos. 09/2023 and 56/2023 were vitiated and illegal. The Court found that these notifications curtailed the limitation otherwise available, proceeded on an erroneous understanding of the Supreme Court’s orders, extinguished vested rights of action, were arbitrary, and in the case of Notification No. 56/2023, were issued without proper GST Council recommendation.
Following the said binding decision, the Court in the present case held that Notification Nos. 09/2023 and 56/2023 were vitiated and illegal. However, the Court clarified that initiation of proceedings by invoking Section 168A of the CGST Act was valid, in view of the extension of limitation granted by the Supreme Court in Suo Motu proceedings.
