The Jharkhand High Court has held that the benefit under the Sabka Vishwas (Legacy Dispute Resolution) Scheme, 2019 (SVLDRS scheme), cannot be denied by the Designated Committee on the sole basis of Departmental decision to file an appeal against the order.
A demand-cum-show-cause notice was issued to the petitioner, M/s Om Prakash Kashyapfor the levy of service tax, including the cess. The order was passed, and the Adjudicating Authority confirmed the demand. Meanwhile, the Central Government launched the SVLDRS Scheme in 2019.
Further, the Government had extended the cut-off date to avail the benefit of the Scheme from 31st December 2019 to 15th January 2020 vide notification no.07/2019 dated 31st December 2019. The Petitioner had undertaken not to prefer an appeal during the proceedings before the Adjudicating Authority.
The Petitioner filed a declaration in form SVLDRS1 under the category of “Arrears” and “Tax Dues less Tax Relief”. Thereafter, the Petitioner was served with a notice in Form SVLDRS-2 by the Designated Committee that the Department taken a decision to file an appeal against the order.
On that basis the case of the petitioner falls under “litigation category” and not under “arrears category”. The Petitioner duly replied disagreeing with the notice in SVLDRS-2A (Annexure-10).
On May 15, 2020, however, his declaration in Form SVLDRS-I was rejected on the sole basis that the respondents had decided to file an appeal against the original order. Thus, the benefit of the scheme cannot be extended to the petitioner under the “arrears” category. The Department filed its appeal after the petitioner’s declaration in form SVLDRS-I was rejected.
The division bench of Acting Chief Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh and Justice Deepak Roshan observed that “the Designated Committee travelled beyond the purview of the Scheme and acted in a wholly illegally and arbitrary manner by denying the benefit of the Scheme to the petitioner. It appears that the benefit of Scheme has been extended from 31 December, 2019 to 15th January, 2020, vide Notification dated 31″ December, 2019, issued by Central Government.”
“The Designated Committee constituted under the Scheme was only required to verify the correctness of the declaration filed by the declarant and estimate the amount payable by such declarant for availing the benefit of the said Scheme. Thus, Designated Committee has not been vested with any jurisdiction to deny the benefit of the Scheme to a declarant on the sole ground that department has taken for filing an Appeal against the Order-in-Original” the Bench noted.
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