Case Law Details
Manju Bala Vs SJP Hotel and Resorts Pvt. Ltd. (NAA)
The only plea of the Respondent before this Authority is that he has passed on the benefit of ITC amounting to Rs 9,77,49,000/- to all his customers and has submitted sample acknowledgement receipts claimed to have been received from the customers vide which, according to the Respondent, the customers have acknowledged that they had received the benefit of ITC from the Respondent In this regard, this Authority finds that with respect to the above claim and contention of the Respondent, the DGAP was directed to verify whether the Respondent has passed on the benefit of ITC to the 51 customers as per the list provided by him or not. The DGAP gave ample opportunities to the Respondent to submit the details as required by the DGAP so that the above claim of the Respondent can be verified at least for such homebuyers/customers on a sample basis However, the Respondent has not submitted the requisite documents/information before the DGAP. Further, during the course of nearing the Applicants have also submitted that the acknowledgement receipts submitted by the Respondent before this Authority are fake and the signatures of the recipients are forged. Further. upon perusal of the submissions filed by the Respondent. it is revealed that the Respondent has not submitted all the purported acknowledgement receipts received from each and every customer/flat buyer Ito whom ITC benefit is claimed to have been passed on) stating that they have received the benefit of ITC from the Respondent Hence, the claim of the Respondent that he has passed on the benefit of ITC to all his customers is not substantiated by any verifiable record so as to determine the veracity of such claim Hence, such claim of the Respondent needs proper and in depth verification by way of receipt of acknowledgement’s from each and every customer that they have received the benefit of ITC from the Respondent and verification of the It authenticity of such documents. This is especially necessary as the Applicants have unequivocally alleged that signatures have been forged and sample receipts are fake Hence in the absence of authentic acknowledgment receipts/ verifiable evidence/ documents from the customers/flat buyers, the Authority finds that it cannot be accepted that the Respondent has passed on the benefit of ITC to his homebuyers/customers/recipients
Further, all the Applicants have submitted that they have not received the benefit of ITC from the Respondent (as has been claimed by him) and the acknowledgement receipts submitted by the Respondent are fake and the signatures of the flat buyers/customers on the acknowledgement receipts are forged by the Respondent. With respect to the above contention of the Applicants. It would be relevant to mention that the mandate of this Authority lies within the provisions of Section 171 of the CGST Act, 2017 This Authority has only been mandated to investigate whether both the benefits of tax reduction and ITC have been passed on the to the consumers or not Hence, any other such issue/allegation as raised by the Applicants, which is not related to profiteering, cannot he entertained by the Authority. Therefore, the Applicants may approach the appropriate Authority with respect to the issues which are not related to determination of the profiteered amount
Hence, this Authority finds that. it is established from the above fads that the Respondent has benefited from the additional ITC to the extent of 4 25% of the turnover during the period from July 2017 to December 2019 and hence the provisions of Section 171 of the CGST Act. 2017 have been contravened by the Respondent as he has not passed on the benefit of such additional ITC to his customers Thus this Authority determines the profiteered amount as Rs. 6,87,58,6861-(inclusive of GST @ 12% or 8% as applicable) in terms of Rule 133 (1) of the CGST Rules. 2017 [This amount is inclusive of profiteered amount. if any, in respect of the Applicant no. s 1 to 12) The above amount that has been profiteered by the Respondent from his home buyers shall be refunded/returned/passed on by him, if not already passed on, along with interest @18% thereon, from the date when the above amount was profiteered by him till the date of such payment, in accordance with the provisions of Rule 133 (3) (b) of the GCST Rules 2017.
This Authority under Rule 133 (3) (a) of the CGST Rules. 2017 orders that the Respondent shall reduce the prices to be realized from the buyers of the Units commensurate with the benefit of ITC received by him as has been detailed above
Please become a Premium member. If you are already a Premium member, login here to access the full content.
