State of Uttar Pradesh & Anr. Vs Bambino Agro Industries Ltd & Anr. (Supreme Court of India)
The dispute concerns a fundamental issue under the GST regime: whether merely uploading a show cause notice or adjudication order on the GST portal amounts to valid “communication” for the purpose of computing limitation under Section 107 of the CGST/UPGST Acts. The Allahabad High Court examined a batch of petitions where taxpayers challenged adjudication orders on the ground that neither the show cause notices nor the final orders had been effectively communicated to them. According to the petitioners, they became aware of the orders only when recovery proceedings commenced, by which time the statutory period for filing appeals had already expired.
The High Court noted that Section 107 permits an appeal within three months from the date on which the order is “communicated” to the aggrieved person, while Section 169 prescribes various modes of service, including making documents available on the common GST portal and sending communications through email. The Court observed that although electronic service is legally recognized, the crucial issue is whether such service results in effective communication of the order to the taxpayer.
A significant factor considered by the Court was the functioning of the GST portal. GSTN informed the Court that the portal does not maintain any electronic trail showing when a taxpayer viewed, opened, downloaded, or otherwise accessed a notice or order uploaded on the portal. The system also lacks a mechanism to confirm whether an email or SMS alert was actually seen by the recipient. As a result, the revenue authorities cannot conclusively establish the date on which a taxpayer became aware of the uploaded order.
