GSTAT Holds GST Portal Glitches Cannot Defeat Statutory Remedy:

The adjudicating authority, Deputy Commissioner, State Tax,  passed an order against the taxpayer on 26 February 2022. Ordinarily, the first appeal under Section 107 of the CGST or UPGST Acts was required to be filed within three months from communication of the order. However, the taxpayer filed the first appeal on 31 January 2024, relying on the amnesty scheme introduced through Notification No. 53/2023 dated 2 November 2023, which permitted eligible taxpayers to file certain time-barred appeals subject to prescribed conditions.

Under the scheme, the taxpayer was required to deposit 12.5% of the remaining disputed tax, with at least 20% of that pre-deposit being paid through the electronic cash ledger. The taxpayer contended that technical difficulties on the GST portal prevented the requisite allocation through the electronic cash ledger and, consequently, the entire pre-deposit was debited through the electronic credit ledger. The first appellate authority dismissed the appeal after the taxpayer failed to appear on the scheduled hearing date.

The Tribunal observed that the amnesty scheme permitted eligible taxpayers to seek admission of time-barred appeals subject to payment of the prescribed pre-deposit. In the present case, the taxpayer maintained that it had made a bona fide attempt to comply with the scheme but was unable to make the required cash-ledger payment because of technical difficulties.

The Tribunal held that a shortfall or misallocation in the components of a pre-deposit is a curable defect. The first appellate authority had erred in summarily dismissing the appeal without giving the taxpayer a reasonable opportunity to make good the differential cash payment or rebalance the ledger debits.

Accordingly, the Tribunal held that rejection of the appeal solely because the pre-deposit was debited through the electronic credit ledger was not legally sustainable. It reiterated that technical glitches on the GST portal cannot be allowed to prejudice a taxpayer’s statutory remedy of appeal. The GSTAT allowed the appeal and set aside the order dated 25 September 2024 dismissing the taxpayer’s first appeal as time-barred.