Eligibility under the Sabka Vishwas (Legacy Dispute Resolution) Scheme, 2019 is contingent upon the quantification of duty demand on or before the 30th day of June, 2019, and the admission of tax liability by the declarant before the cut off date. Rejection of application without affording any opportunity of hearing to the declarant would be in violation of the principles of natural justice.

JUDGMENT

Ujjal Bhuyan, J. - Heard Ms. Deepali Kamble, learned counsel for the petitioner and Mr. Sham Walve, learned counsel along with Mr. Yadav learned counsel for the respondents.

2. By filing this petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, petitioner seeks quashing of order dated 02.01.2020 passed by the respondents rejecting the declaration of the petitioner dated 8.12.2019 under the Sabka Vishwas (Legacy Dispute Resolution) Scheme, 2019 (briefly "the scheme" hereinafter) and further seeks a direction to the respondents to reconsider the said declaration and thereafter grant the relief(s) to the petitioner.

3. Petitioner is a private limited company engaged in the business of providing construction services to its customers. Being a service provider, it was registered as such under the Finance Act, 1994.

4. Respondent No. 3 initiated an enquiry against the petitioner for alleged short payment of service tax for the period from April 2012 to June 2017. It is submitted that in the course of the enquiry, statement of the director of the petitioner Mr. Surajpal Singh was recorded before the respondents on 09.04.2019 wherein he admitted service tax liability of the petitioner to the extent of Rs. 40 to Rs. 45 lakhs (approximately) for the aforesaid period.

5. When the scheme was introduced by the Finance (No. 2) Act, 2019, Petitioner submitted declaration thereunder under the category of "investigation, enquiry or audit" with further sub-categorisation of "investigation by commissionerate". In the declaration, petitioner disclosed the quantum of service tax liability at Rs. 43,37,865.00 further stating that it had made pre-deposit of Rs. 18,26,253.00.

6. However, by order dated 02.01.2020, the said declaration of the petitioner was rejected on the ground of ineligibility with the remark that the amount of service tax liability of the petitioner was not quantified before 30.06.2019 which is the cutoff date under the scheme.

7. Aggrieved, the present writ petition has been filed seeking the relief(s) as indicated above.

8. Respondents have filed reply affidavit. Stand taken in the reply affidavit is that as per statement on record dated 09.04.2019, petitioner had agreed to produce financial documents for the period from 2013-14 to 2017-18 by 22.04.2019 but failed to submit the same before the investigating authority. Therefore, as per section 125(1)(e) of the Finance (No. 2) Act, 2019, since the amount of duty involved had not been quantified on or before 30.06.2019, petitioner was not eligible to avail benefit under the scheme. As such, the designated committee was justified in rejecting such declaration of the petitioner.

9. When this matter was heard on 27.01.2021, we had passed the following order:-

"2. Petitioner had filed declaration under the Sabka Vishwas (Legacy Dispute Resolution) Scheme, 2019 under the category of "investigation, enquiry or audit". The declaration has been rejected by the Designated Committee on the ground that that amount of tax dues was not quantified on or before 30th June, 2019.

3. Learned counsel for the petitioner submits that Director of the petitioner Shri. Surajpal Singh had got his statement recorded before the respondents on 9th April, 2019, wherein he admitted the service tax dues to the extent of Rs. 40 to Rs. 45 lakhs. Thus the tax dues were quantified on or before 30th June, 2019.

4. However, this document is not on record.

5. Learned counsel for the petitioner may file additional affidavit enclosing therewith a copy of the said statement furnishing copy to learned counsel for the respondents."

10. Thereafter learned counsel for the petitioner has filed the additional affidavit bringing on record the statement recorded on 09.04.2019 as well as copy of show-cause notice issued to the petitioner subsequently on 26.06.2020.

11. Submissions made by learned counsel for the parties are on pleaded lines. Therefore, a detailed reference to the same is considered not necessary. However, the subm