The main legal point established in the judgment is the principle of unjust enrichment and the applicability of Section 54 of the CGST Act in claiming refunds under the GST regime.

ORDER :

A.V.RAVINDRA BABU, J.

This Writ Petition, under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, came to be filed by the petitioner for the following relief:

“...................... to issue an appropriate writ, order or direction, more in the nature of Writ of Mandamus, setting aside the communication of the Superintendent of Central GST, Bheemavaram Range vide his Reference No: OC No:-151/2021 dated 26-2-2021 and directing the Respondent No:- 1 & the Respondent No:- 2 to permit the Petitioner to rectify the details of the recipient of the services in the form GSTR – 1 for the quarter ending on 30-6-2018 to enable M/s. Vodafone Mobile Services Ltd., Kondla Koya, Telangana State, to claim the credit of IGST of Rs. 7,87,328=78 or to refund the sum of Rs. 7,87,328=78 to the petitioner which is paid on the transactions which are not actually conducted, and pass such other order or orders ..........”

2. The facts leading to filing of the present Writ Petition are as follows:

The petitioner is the taxable person under the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 (for short, ‘the CGST Act’) and the Andhra Pradesh Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 (for short, ‘the APGST Act’), allotted with Goods and Services Tax Identification Number (GSTIN) 37AAPV7646A1ZT. The petitioner is also allotted to the Central State Tax Department and comes under the Bhimavaram Central GST Range headed by the Superintendent of Central Goods and Services Tax. The petitioner is entitled to file quarterly returns. The petitioner has been submitting the common returns and the details of outward supplies regularly both under the APGST Act, CGST Act and also under the Integrated Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 (for short, ‘the IGST Act’) electronically through the common portal duly reporting the intra-state supplies of goods and services as mandated and also inter-state supply of goods and services under the IGST Act since July, 2017.

3. The petitioner is engaged in business of supplying telecom pipe laying services in the State of Telangana like M/s.Vodafone Mobile Services Limited, Kandlakoya Village, Medchal Mandal of Telangana State, whose another office is located at Mumbai. The petitioner supplied the cable laying services at Kandlakoya of Telangana State. However, the petitioner erroneously issued two tax invoices covering the said supply of cable laying services to M/s.Vodafone Mobile Services Limited, Mumbai and two other tax invoices in the month of June, 2018 declaring the IGST liability and also issued a credit note No.10 for total value of Rs.3,11,619=12 (with IGST Rs.47,535=12) reducing the original supply consideration charged in the said two tax invoices issued by them to M/s.Vodafone Mobile Services Limited, Mumbai for the tax period June, 2018. The tax invoices issued in March, 2018 are returned in Form GSTR 3B for the tax period of April, 2018 and the petitioner furnished details of such invoices in Form GSTR-1 for June, 2018 and they are returned in both Form GSTR-1 for the quarter ending 30.06.2018.

4. While keying in the said details and returns information in the GST common portal, the GSTIN of M/s.Vodafone Mobile Services Limited, Mumbai i.e., 27AAACS4457Q1ZQ inadvertently keyed in instead of the GSTIN of M/s.Vodafone Mobile Services Limited, Kandlakoya, Medchal Mandal, Rangareddy District, Telangana. In reality, they are inter-state supplies of cable laying services in the State of Telangana. This is purely an inadvertent mistake committed in the tax periods of the GST regime. Because of this human error, the actual recipient of cable laying services from the petitioner at Telangana is not able to claim the credit of the IGST paid by the petitioner. After realising this mistake, the petitioner tried to rectify this mistake in May, 2020 but in vain. The GST common portal is not permitting the same, because the time available for rectification of such mistake is only up to 20.10.2019. The petitioner realized this mistake in May, 2020 when M/s.