Yes, the Honorable Madras High Court in the case of P S K Engineering Construction & Co. v. Assistant Commissioner of GST & Central Excise [Writ Petition No. 13418 of 2024 dated June 10, 2024] held that there is no restriction in statute for Central GST authorities to initiate proceedings on different subject matter that it is already adjudicated by State Authorities. The Honorable Madras High Court noted that on perusal of the Impugned Notice, it is clear that such notice was issued while being fully aware of Section 6(2)(b) of the CGST Act. However, there is no restriction to initiate any proceedings on any other subject matter by the Central Tax Authority. Accordingly, the officer intended to conduct an audit under the provisions of section 65 of the CGST Act. The Honorable Court held that the subject matter of the audit was not the same subject matter as proceedings initiated by the State GST authorities, there is no restriction in the statute. Therefore, the writ petition was disposed of by leaving it open to the petitioner to respond to the Impugned Notice.
Author’s Comments
As per Section 6(2)(b) of the CGST Act, if a proper officer under the SGST Act or the UTGST Act has initiated any proceedings on a subject matter, no proceedings shall be initiated by the proper officer under the CGST Act on the same subject matter. In the considered opinion of the Author, there is no bar under the law that once a proceeding is initiated for a particular period by the CGST department, no proceedings can be issued by the SGST or UTGST authorities or vice versa for the same period. The only bar that the statute places is regarding proceedings based on the same cause-of-action and the same subject matter (in a few circumstances, even for the same cause-of-action, parallel proceedings are permissible). Section 6(2)(b) of the Act comes into play only when overlapping SCN is issued for the same subject matter for the same period. Important to highlight that the cross-empowerment is allowed for proceedings carried out under section 67 of the Act only.
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