In a recent decision the Calcutta High Court directed the Assistant Commissioner of Revenue to file affidavit-in-opposition in the matter of attachment of bank account.
The petitioner,Mohammad Ilyas, filed the writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. D. Ghosh, advocate for the State respondent submitted that the issues involved in this writ petition are arguable question of law and petitioner is relying several decisions of different High Courts which the respondent wants to distinguish.
Attachment of a bank account (whether a current or deposit account) is among the procedures commonly used by government bodies to recover debts (such as overdue taxes, fines or charges, and debts to the Social Security System, etc.) from individuals and legal entities. The attachment order may also be issued as a result of a court ruling following litigation to recover a debt.
Section 83 of the Central GST Act empowers the Commissioner to provisionally attach the assets of a taxable person. The attachment can be made where, after initiation of any proceedings, the Commissioner is of the opinion that for the purpose of protecting the interest of the Government revenue.
Section 83(1) of the CGST Act that deals with provisional attachment of any property to protect revenue, has been amended in a manner, to widen the scope of the power to provisionally attach any property by replacing specified Sections covered therein with complete Chapters of the CGST Act.
The Court of Justice Md. Nizamuddin opined that “The issues involved deserves adjudication after calling for affidavits from the respondents. Let the respondents file affidavit-in-opposition within four weeks, petitioner to file reply thereto, if any, within two weeks thereafter.”
The Court concluded by noting that there will be the stay of operation of the impugned order of attachment of bank account of the petitioner.
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