Currently in investigations involving multiple taxpayers across states, such as fake input tax credit rackets, circular trading and invoice fraud cases, a single common adjudicating authority passes one adjudication order covering taxpayers registered in different states.
Field formations are unclear over which commissioner should decide whether to challenge an appellate order before the Goods and Services Tax Appellate Tribunal (GSTAT) and which tribunal bench would hear such appeals.
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While the law clearly provides for first appeals under Section 107 of the CGST Act, tax officers have sought clarity on the departmental appeal process before GSTAT under Section 112, particularly after the tribunal became operational.
The new framework seeks to ensure that while adjudication remains centralised, each taxpayer’s jurisdictional commissioner independently decides on filing an appeal before the bench having territorial jurisdiction over that taxpayer, eliminating the uncertainty over whether appeals should be routed through the commissionerate overseeing the common adjudicating authority.
The department will soon issue a formal circular in this regard. Once an appellate authority passes an order under Section 107, it will upload the order on the GST portal and send both electronic and physical copies to the principal commissioner or commissioner having jurisdiction over the common adjudicating authority.
The commissioner supervising the common adjudicating authority will examine the order, obtain comments from the Directorate General of GST Intelligence (DGGI) wherever required and forward recommendations to the jurisdictional Central GST commissioners of all taxpayers covered by the adjudication order. This is significant for investigations by the DGGI, where a single common adjudicating authority often passes one order covering taxpayers registered in different states, officials said.