GANGTOK, India, June 5 -- Sikkim High Court issued the following judgment/order on May 15:
1. The appellant is aggrieved by the judgment of the learned single Judge in WP(C) No.02 of 2023 (Glenmark Pharmaceuticals Limited vs. Union of India and Others), dated 06-05-2024, vide which, the order dated 01-03-2022 of the respondent no.3, was upheld and the writ petition dismissed.
2. The respondent no.3, in the order of 01-03-2022, impugned before the learned single Judge inter alia observed that the procedure of sanctioning budgetary support was enunciated in the Circulars dated 27-11-2017, of the Central Board of Excise & Customs, Department of Revenue, Ministry of Finance, Government of India and 10-01-2019 of the Central Board of Indirect Taxes & Customs, Department of Revenue, Ministry of Finance, Government of India. The petitioners claim for budgetary support for the period July, 2017 to September, 2017, was rejected by respondent no.3 while allowing its claims for October, 2017 to June, 2018, reasoning that in terms of the computation prescribed in Circular, dated 27-11-2017, the appellants claim for budgetary support, after aggregating the tax liabilities and input tax credit and considering that the balance of input tax credit was in the negative, the appellant was not entitled to any budgetary support for the said period.
3. The learned single Judge, by the order dated 06-05-2024, in WP(C) No.02 of 2023, observed inter alia that, the petitioner admittedly did not follow the budgetary scheme or the instructions of the two Circulars, dated 27-11-2017 and 10-01-2019, to file claim application on a quarterly basis, instead of which, the petitioner filed separate claims for the months of July and August, 2017, under one covering letter. By this process, the petitioner claimed separate amounts for April 2017 and August, 2017. No claim for budgetary support was made for September, 2017. Referring to the Circular dated 27-11-2017, it was observed that, the claim for budgetary support was required to be calculated in the manner provided therein, as it was issued in furtherance of the budgetary support scheme. The learned Court observed that the petitioner intended to make the authorities work out the budgetary support on the basis of monthly claims, filed by them earlier and not on a quarterly basis as required under the budgetary support scheme. Although the Circular dated 27- 11-2017, permitted manual application for budgetary support for the quarter ending September, 2017, it did not digress from the mandate of paragraph 5.4 of the budgetary support scheme. The Circular dated 10-01-2019, permitted the assessee to provide month-wise details in the table annexed to the refund application to enable speedier and accurate verification of the refund claims and to make the process of verification refund claims easier. The assessee would fill monthly returns under the Goods and Services Tax (GST), whereas the refund application was for the quarter. Therefore, when the petitioner was required by the authorities to modify their initial application to a quarterly basis as required under the law, they had no choice but to reflect the balance of input tax credit of Central Goods and Service Tax (CGST) for the month of September, 2017 as well. Rationalising thus, the Court dismissed the writ petition.
The rest of the document can be viewed at https://hcs.gov.in/hcs/hg_orders/203600000022024_10.pdf
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