The Madras High Court recently ruled that imposing a tax on proposals that are uncommunicated to the Assessee shall amount to the violation of the principles of natural justice.
The Assessee, D.S. Balachandran is a dealer under the Tamil Nadu Value added tax (TNVAT) Act, was originally served with five proposals but certain other defects were identified from the returns and mismatch from the website.
According to the counsel for the revenue department, those materials were readily available at the office of the revenue and since the assessee failed to appear before the authorities, those materials could not be served to the assessee.
Justice M. Govindaraj set aside the order and remanded the matter back to the revenue department for fresh consideration. He further directed, “issue fresh notice incorporating all the proposals along with materials relied on by him and call for objections from the petitioner, within a period of 15 days from the date of receipt of a copy of this order and in service of such pre-revision notice, the petitioner shall submit his objections within a period of 15 days thereafter. The second respondent is directed to pass orders after affording a personal hearing to the petitioner within a period of 15 days from the date of receipt of objections from the petitioner.”
Subscribe Taxscan Premium to view the Judgment
