J&K HC Allows Secondary & Higher Education Cess Refund to Coromandel Intl. Ltd. noting Finality of Supreme Court’s SRD Nutrients Ruling [Read Order]
The High Court held that a subsequent decision of the Supreme Court cannot have bearing on past decisions which had attained finality.
J&K HC - Secondary Higher Education - Cess Refund - Coromandel Intl Ltd - Supreme Court - taxscan
J&K HC - Secondary Higher Education - Cess Refund - Coromandel Intl Ltd - Supreme Court - taxscan
The Jammu & Kashmir High Court recently directed the Union of India and excise authorities to release the refund of Secondary and Higher Education (SHE) Cess to a petitioner, holding that the issue stood concluded in the company’s favour as per an earlier decision by the Supreme Court of India which had attained finality.
The petitioner, M/s Coromandel International Ltd., represented by Gautam Chugh is an entity engaged in manufacturing pesticides at its Bari-Brahmana unit and was entitled to excise duty refund under Notification No. 56/2002-CE dated 14 November 2002.
While refunds of basic excise duty were sanctioned to the petitioner, authorities denied refund of education cess and SHE cess.
The Customs, Excise and Service Tax Appellate Tribunal (CESTAT), Chandigarh, however had allowed Coromandel’s appeals in 2018, placing reliance on the Supreme Court’s decision in SRD Nutrients Pvt. Ltd. v. CCE, Guwahati (2018) where it was held that cess being a surcharge could not survive once the primary excise duty itself was exempted.
The Revenue, represented by Dheeraj Nanda had challenged multiple similar orders, all of which were dismissed by a Division Bench of the J&K High Court in May 2022. The ratio was upheld by the Supreme Court, which had dismissed the Revenue’s SLP against the final order delivered by the J&K High Court in Saraswati Agro Chemicals Pvt. Ltd. (2023).
The Bench of Justice Sanjeev Kumar and Justice Sanjay Parihar observed that the order by CESTAT in favour of Coromandel had not been challenged in appeal and had thus attained finality.
Rejecting the Revenue’s plea to withhold relief on account of a pending miscellaneous application before the Supreme Court seeking modification of the decision in SRD Nutrients (supra), the High Court noted that the Apex Court had already clarified that matters concluded on the basis of SRD Nutrients could not be reopened despite the same being overruled in Unicorn Industries v. Union of India (2020).
Accordingly, the Jammu & Kashmir High Court allowed the writ petition and directed the respondents to release the refund of education cess and secondary and higher education cess, together with applicable interest within two months from the date of receipt of the order.
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