Venugopal C vs State Of Kerala

Dinesh Kumar Singh, J

The present writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India has been filed impugning the assessment orders Exts.P5 and P6 by the 3rd respondent to the 5th respondent, a partnership firm - M/s Millennium Spices & Commodities, pertaining to the Assessment Year 2002-03.

The only contention of the learned Counsel for the petitioner is that he was a partner of the said firm and retired from the partnership firm on 17.10.2000. Therefore, issuing notice to him for payment of the assessed amount of KGST is illegal.

The question of whether the petitioner retired from the partnership firm on 17.10.2000 and whether he had intimated the authorities by giving notice in Form 3 is a disputed question of fact that cannot be gone into by this Court. Admittedly, there is an alternate remedy of appeal under the KGST Act under Section 34 of the Act.

The writ Court is not expected to go into the disputed question of fact. Therefore, the petitioner is relegated to the appellate authority. An interim order was granted in this writ petition when the petition was filed, which remains in operation. Therefore, it is provided that if the petitioner files an appeal within a period of 30 days, the appellate authority will decide the appeal on merit without going into the question of delay inasmuch as the writ petition has remained pending before this Court for all these years.

For a period of 30 days from today, the interim order dated 08.07.2014 passed by this Court shall remain in operation. The appellate authority is required to decide the appeal expeditiously, preferably within a period of two months from the date of its filing. If the petitioner does not file the appeal within one month from today, the authority concerned will be free to recover the amount assessed along with interest and penalty from the petitioner as per the relevant provisions of law.

With the aforesaid direction and observation, the present writ petition stands finally disposed of. It is made clear that this Court has not given a finding on the merits of the case, and the appellate authority will independently go into the merits of the issue and decide in accordance with the law.