In a recent case before the Delhi High Court, the GST demand order was set aside owing to the inaccessibility of the Show Cause Notice ( SCN ) on the GST portal.
The petitioner Sadhna Kohli through Advocate Preetam Singh filed a petition against the impugned order passed by the adjudicating authority under Section 73 of the Delhi Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017.
The impugned order was passed under the Show Cause Notice ( SCN ) dated 26.09.2023 to which the petitioner did not respond. Consequently, the impugned order was passed confirming the demand proposed regarding the SCN.
The petitioner prayed for one more opportunity to respond to the SCN and to remand the matter to the adjudicating authority to decide afresh.
The petitioner claimed to have never received the SCN and therefore couldn’t respond. The petitioner also stated that her access to the portal was limited as the GST registration was canceled then.
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She also stated that the SCN was not readily accessible on the GST portal as it was placed under a tab of ‘Additional Notices and Orders’ and the petitioner had no occasion to access the same.
The court was informed that the GST portal was later on redesigned to place the notices as well as additional notices and orders under the menu item ‘View Notices and Orders.’ Therefore the issue was resolved and users can view both tabs on the same page.
The Division Bench of Justice Vibhu Bakhru and Justice Sachin Datta observed that at the material time of issuance of the SCN, the tab was not placed in a position that would invite the taxpayer’s attention. Therefore the petition was allowed, setting aside the impugned order.
The court also directed the petitioner to reply to the SCN along with relevant documents. The adjudicating authority will then consider the same and pass an appropriate order after allowing the petitioner to be heard.
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