The Allahabad bench of the Customs, Excise and Service Tax Appellate Tribunal (CESTAT) granted relief to the Pathanjali trust by directing the original authority to re-compute the service tax demand for the period from 01.10.2006 to 31.03.2007 on the ground of absence of Chartered Accountant Certificate.
Patanjali Yogpeeth Trust, the appellant assessee was engaged in the activity of providing services relating to health and fitness by way of teaching yoga and meditation, and the assessee’s trust working under the aegis of Baba Ramdev and Acharya Balkrishna are inter-alia engaged in providing Yoga training to various residential and non-residential camps.
For participation in such camps, a charge of participation fees from the participants on the name of the donation was taken and this amount was collected at donation but it was fees for providing the services and hence covered under the definition of consideration.
The assessee appealed against the order passed by the Commissioner of Customs and Central Excise for confirming the service tax demand for the period of 01.10.2006 to 31.03.2007 and the penalty on the activities of yoga service rendered by the assessee.
Atul Gupta and Prakhar Shukla, the counsels for the assessee contended that the balance sheet maybe provides some details but these generally do not provide precise details to enable the department to issue demand notices. In any case, the balance sheet may be a public document but the question is whether the balance sheet or information was given to the assessing authorities.
In the present case, the assessee did not provide the information in July 2007. They did not pay the service tax as per the direction for the period.
Sarweshwar T. Khairnar, the counsel for the department relied on the decisions made by the lower authorities and contended that the demand and penalty raised by the revenue was as per the law and liable to be sustained.
The Bench observed that the demand for the period 01.10.2006 to 31.03.2007 needs to be recomputed after reconciling the amounts received by the appellant during that period with the accounts of the appellant and the certificate of the Chartered Accountant.
The two-member bench comprising Choudhary (Judicial) and Sanjiv Srivastava (Technical) directed to re-compute the demand for service tax for the period from 01.10.2006 to 31.03.2007.
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