TMI Blog2022 (8) TMI 96X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... - It is evident that strictly going by the terminology used in the immunity provision under Clause 5 of the circular dated 14.09.2018, the benefit flowing wherefrom may not be available to the petitioner but this Court hastens to add that in penal provision such as Section 129 of the GST Act, the element of intention to evade tax must be present to sustain an order of penalty. To gather the intention of the petitioner an inquiry has to be undertaken to ascertain whether the mistake was inadvertent with no element of malice or intention to evade tax - It does not appear that either the Taxing Authority or the appellate authority has undertaken the said exercise of conducting an inquiry to ascertain the real intent behind the act of petitione ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... which the registered address of the petitioner at Indore was mentioned in the e-way bill instead of the address at Jabalpur. It is submitted that since the address which was earlier shown as Indore as default address in the online option could not be manually changed and therefore continued to show the destination of goods as Indore instead of Jabalpur. Learned counsel for the petitioner relied upon a Coordinate Bench decision rendered in WP No.12913/2020 ( Robbins Tunnelling and Trenchless Technology (India) Pvt. Ltd. vs. State of M.P. and others ). 4. Learned counsel for the Revenue on the other hand relying upon the executive instruction dated 14.09.2018 (Annexure P/9) of the Department of Revenue, Ministry of Finance, Government of ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... address of the consignee subject to locality and other details of consignee is mentioned correctly. It is submitted by Shri Dharmadhikari that bare perusal of the e-way bill (Annexure P/5) demonstrate that the details of locality and other details of the consignee are incorrectly mentioned and therefore the benefit of clause 5 in the circular dated 14.09.2018 is not available to the petitioner. It is further submitted by Shri Dharmadhikari that the possibility of tax evasion on the part of the petitioner cannot be ruled out. It is further submitted that the immunity of clause 5 in the circular dated 14.09.2018 (Annexure P/9) is unavailable to persons who do not come with clean hands and the mistake in the address is not purely inadvertent w ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... o be same but the address and other details were correct and therefore immunity available in clause 5(c) of the circular dated 14.09.2018 was available to the petitioners therein. The present case is attended with distinct facts of address and other details also not being correct. 9 . In the conspectus of above discussion, this Court has no manner of doubt that an inquiry needs to be conducted at the level of appellate authority to ascertain whether there was any malicious intention to evade tax on the part of the petitioner or not. 10 . Consequently, the present petition stands partly allowed to the following extent: (i) The impugned appellate order dated 18.12.2019 (Annexure P/7) stands quashed. (ii) The appellate auth ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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