Delhi High Court Gives Fresh Hearing as GST Notices Uploaded on Additional Notices Tab

The Delhi High Court has set aside two GST orders passed by the GST department, as the company was not given a proper opportunity to respond to the relevant notices.

The company Jarosniv Exports argued in the court that the Show Cause Notices (SCNs) were uploaded only under the “Additional Notices“ tab on the GST portal. Due to this, the company was unaware of the notices and could not file its reply. The company argued that the final GST orders were passed ex parte by the GST department.

The Court cited previous rulings, where notices were also uploaded under the tab  “Additional Notices,” due to which the petitioner could not reply to the notices. In those cases, the court had quashed the orders, observing that the petitioner did not have access to the notices, as they were projected under the tab “Additional Notices & Orders.”

Even though one of the SCNs was uploaded, after the GST portal system was updated for better visibility, the court said that the petitioner company must be given one more chance to ensure that it gets a fair opportunity to be heard.

Therefore, the court set aside both the orders and allowed the company four weeks to file its replies to the notices. The tax department was directed to provide a proper personal hearing and to send hearing notices through registered email and mobile number.