M/s. Meena Advertisers Versus Director General of Goods & Service Tax Intelligence, The Senior Intelligence Office GGST Mumbai, The Commissioner of GST & Central Excise, The Superintendent of GST
Service Tax
2018 (4) TMI 1232 – MADRAS HIGH COURT – 2018 (16) G. S. T. L. 448 (Mad.)
MADRAS HIGH COURT – HC
Dated:- 12-4-2018
W.P.No.3525 of 2018 & W.M.P. No.4305 of 2018
Service Tax
T. S. Sivagnanam, J.
For the Petitioner : Mr. R. Anishkumar
For the Respondents : Mr. V. Sundareswaran Mr.S.R.Sundar
ORDER
Heard Mr.R.Anishkumar, learned counsel for the petitioner, Mr.V.Sundareswara, learned Senior Standing Counsel, for the respondents 1 and 2 and Mr.S.R.Sundar, learned Senior Standing Counsel for the respondents 3 and 4.
2. The petitioner is a proprietor of an Advertising Firm under the name and style of “M/s.Meena Advertisers”. In this writ petition, the petitioner seeks for issuance of Writ of Certiorarified Mandamus to quash the summons dated 02.01.2018 issued by th
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ity. By referring to the said condition in the circular, it is submitted by the learned counsel for the petitioner that the investigation should be shifted to Chennai.
4. The learned Standing Counsel appearing for the respondents 1 and 2 submitted that the petitioner had admitted that he was rending taxable service before 01.07.2012 as well as after 01.07.2012 from places, such as, Chennai, Mumbai, Jaipur and Mangalore and he was remitting the service tax. Further it is submitted that the Centralized Service Tax Registration Certificate dated 12.01.2007 does not mention any place other than Chennai and in terms of Rule 4 (2) and (3) of the Service Tax Rules, 1994, the petitioner was required to register such premises or officers from where centralised billing or centralised accounting systems were located. The learned counsel further submits that since the petitioner were doing business in Mumbai and also issuing invoices from their Mumbai office, which was not mentioned in their Cent
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ners seek for issuance of a Writ of Mandamus to prohibit the second respondent from proceeding with the enquiry pursuant to the summons dated 06.11.2017, it is an indirect challenge to the summons. The petitioner having been unsuccessful in its earlier attempt, cannot now maintain these Writ Petitions and indirectly challenged the summons issued by the second respondent. Therefore, the petitioner is estopped from approaching this Court for an identical relief for the second time. Nevertheless, the petitioner has challenged the jurisdiction of the second respondent and this challenge is based on the decision of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Ram Narain Bishwanth & Ors.,(supra) and in that of the Karnataka High Court in Devilog Systems India (supra).
10.The contention advanced by the learned Senior counsel appearing for the petitioners is that the goods were imported through Chennai Port cleared by the Customs Authorities at Chennai and the second respondent being an Officer situated
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eration was whether the notices issued by the Assistant Collector of Customs, Internal Audit Department were legal and valid. In the said case, the Department conceded that for the purposes of the Section 47 of the Act, the proper Officer would be the Assistant Collector of Customs, Bangalore and for Section 28(1), it can be different. The Court held that in the absence of notification dated 01.02.1963, the Audit wing at Madras was not competent to issue notice under Section 28(1) of the Act, merely because, the Madras Audit office is given the power to audit the accounts of Bangalore office. Thus, notices were held to be not issued by the proper officer attached to the jurisdictional Collectorate at Bangalore, where the goods were imported and therefore, the notices were held to be invalid.
12. As rightly pointed out by the learned Senior Standing counsel for the respondents both the decisions arose out of the proceedings under the Customs Act, where the jurisdiction of the Officer/
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he course of investigation and there is power to investigate into past cases.
13. In Dukhishyam Benupani, Asstt. Director, Enforcement Directorate (Fera) vs. Arun Kumar Bajoria reported in (1988) 1 SCC 52, the Hon'ble Supreme Court considered as to whether the officials of the enforcement Directorate could be injuncted from arresting the respondent therein and it was held as follows:-
7.It seems rather unusual that when the aggrieved party approached the High Court challenging the order passed by a subordinate court the High Court made the position worse for the aggrieved party. The officials of the Directorate are now injuncted by the Division Bench from arresting the respondent and the time and places for carrying out the interrogations were also fixed by the Division Bench, Such kind of supervision on the enquiry or investigation under a statute is uncalled for. We have no doubt that such type of interference would impede the even course of enquiry or investigation into the
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ot tenable for the reason that in terms of Section 108, any Customs Officer is entitled to issue notice, which was considered by the Division Bench in the case of South India Exports, (supra), wherein it was held as follows:-
9. We will not deal with the question as to whether the officer, who sent the notice under Sec.108 of the Customs Act, could not have sent the same owing to his not being a Gazetted officer. A statement is made on behalf of the respondents that the concerned officer is a Gazetted officer under the notification and that statement is not seriously disputed by the other side. Even otherwise, there is no reason for us not to accept the statement made by the learned senior counsel at the Bar that all such officers, holding the post of Senior Intelligent Officer, have been given the status of the Gazetted officer. Hence that question is concluded against the appellants.
10. A glance at Sec.108 of the Customs Act, under which the summons is given, would suggest that
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(o), which reads as under:
“Sec.111. Confiscation of improperly imported goods, etc.- The following goods brought from a place outside India shall be liable to confiscation:- … … …
(o) any goods exempted, subject to any condition, from duty or any prohibition in respect of the import thereof under this Act or any other law for the time being in force, in respect of which the condition is not observed unless the non-observance of the condition was sanctioned by the proper officer;” It is therefore clear that a Customs Officer would have all the possible power and more particularly described under Sec.108 of the Act to summon any person obviously to enquire as to whether any goods have been smuggled or not. If, therefore, any goods are brought in India, which enjoy the exemption from the payment of customs duty on certain conditions then, the Customs Officer will have all the powers to enquire as to whether the conditions, subject to which the said duty is exempted, have been
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