Case Law Details
Shivshankar Solvent Extraction Private Limited Vs Commissioner, Commercial Tax Civil Lines (Chhattisgarh High Court)
The issue under consideration is whether High Court can give relaxation from mandatory deposit of tax u/s Section 48(4)(ii) before filing appeal in front of Tribunal?
Appellant is registered under VAT. Suo-Moto proceedings were initiated by Commissioner. In the proceeding F-form issued by the dealers mentioned in schedule were unregistered, which is liable to be rejected, accordingly order is passed with tax liability. The order was put to challenge before Tribunal but dismissed for non-enclosing the receipt of deposit of 20% of the demand. Assessee has filied Writ Petition for requesting them to waive off this pre-deposit criteria and the appeal filed before the Tribunal to be considered for hearing on its merit since he has suffered a huge loss.
On this Writ Petition, Single Judge decided to disposed off the petition by remitting back the case to Tribunal, granting 30 days’ time to the appellant / petitioner for making mandatory deposit before the Tribunal and further directed the Tribunal for restoring the appeal and deciding it on merits subject to depositing the mandatory deposit. Now, the present appeal filed by the assessee against this above mentioned Writ Petition, requesting high Court for the same thing i.e. to waive-off pre-deposit criteria and heard the appeal on the basis of merits.
High Court States that they do not find any tenable ground calling interference in the writ petition order since As per Section 48(4)(ii) of the VAT Act, it is mandatory to deposit the tax at least 20% of tax as pre deposit to sustain the appeal. Further, they state that looking to the facts and circumstances, if time for depositing mandatory deposit is not extended, appellant will remain unheard, which will be prejudicial to the interest of the appellant, HC direct that 30 days’ time granted by Single Judge against writ petition will start from the date of passing of this High Court order.
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