It is necessary to lift the provisional attachments where proceedings under Section 67 of the CGST Act, 2017 is concluded.

Case Details:

Issue- In the above case, the petitioner has challenged the order of provisional attachment passed by the respondent authorities dated 20th January, 2021 in exercise of their power under section 83 Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 (hereinafter referred to as the “CGST Act”). The appellants had filed the writ petition after nearly seven months from the date of which the order of provisional attachment was passed but their case was that they sought for lifting the order of attachment but the authorities did not consider the same. Therefore, they had approached the learned Writ Court. The appellants have prayed for appropriate interim orders to protect their business activities. The learned Single Bench was not inclined to grant any interim protection and directed affidavit-in-opposition be filed by the respondents.

Held- It was held that it will be beneficial to refer to the decision in the case of Kushal Ltd. v. Union of India [2020] 113 taxmann.com 622/78 GST 363/34 GSTL 203 (Guj.) and the decision in the case of Valerious Industries v. Union of India [2019] 109 taxmann.com 218 (Guj.). These decisions also will enure in favour of the appellants/assessee. Thus, for all the above reasons, we are of the view that the order of provisional attachment passed on 20th January, 2021 during the pendency of the proceedings under section 67 of the CGST Act has worked out as admittedly the proceedings under section 67 has already been concluded and the department is said to be in the process of proceeding to take action under section 74 of the CGST Act.  For the above reasons, the writ appeal and the connected application are allowed. Consequently, the writ petition is allowed and the order under appeal dated 20th January, 2021 and the communication dated 14th June, 2021 are quashed and the respondents are directed to intimate the appellants’ banker within one week from the date of receipt of the server copy of this order to lift the attachment of the said bank account.