The Madhya Pradesh High Court quashed the plea seeking direction to consider application under Sabka Vishwas (Legacy Dispute Resolution) Scheme, 2019 (SLVDRS).
The petitioner, M/s Sai Sun Outsourcing Services Private Ltd. is engaged in the business of providing cleaning services and manpower supply services and is registered with the Service Tax Department on Service Tax had been submitting its service tax returns and paying service tax right from the date of its incorporation.
The case was selected for audit by the service tax department and the audit was conducted. After conduct of audit a spot memo was issued by the authorities quantifying the differential tax payable at Rs.19,08,63,167 apart from penalty and interest. The total demand was raised at Rs.32,25,18,555 including penalty and interest.
The petitioner’s case was covered by Section 123(c) of Sabka Vishwas Scheme. The petitioner submitted Form SVLDRS-1 requesting the settlement of tax demand of Rs.10,84,53,602 as computed by the petitioner after rectifying arithmetical mistakes in the spot memo issued by authorities.
During the pendency of SVLDRS-1, under misconception and ill-advise the petitioner submitted a second application on Form SVLDRS-1 showing the total demand of Rs.19,08,94,967.
The authorities in place of processing application in chronological order first processed the application and thereafter processed the petitioner’s application and rejected the same on the ground of duplicate filing whereas this application was original application the application which was accepted by the authorities, filed as a duplicate application.
The respondent authority while denying the relief sought by the petitioner at the outset contend that there is no provision in the statute which requires following of chronological order while processing of SVLDRS application as would require a prior hearing for selecting which application has to be taken up for consideration.
The division judge bench headed by the Acting Chief Justice Sanjay Yadav perceived logic in the action of the respondent in not taking decision on the application, which the Department was not under statutory obligation to have considered first.
Therefore, the court did not find any illegality or a jurisdictional error in considering the application, rendering earlier application as redundant, no interference is caused.
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