Revise TRAN returns by 30-11-2019: P&H HC

Punjab and Haryana High Court has allowed all the tax payers to file or revise TRAN returns by 30-11-2019

In a landmark Judgment by Punjab and Haryana High Court on 4-11-2019 in Adfert Technologies (P.) Ltd, Court has has allowed to file or revise Transitional credit returns electronically or manually for claiming crediting of VAT and Cenvat in pre GST regime.
High Court has directed that nobody shall be denied to carry forward legitimate claim of CENVAT / ITC on the ground of non-filing of TRAN-I by 27.12.2017
No Time restrictions in Section 140: Further High Court held that Certain restrictions are prescribed in proviso to Section 140(1) but restriction in terms of time frame is prescribed under Rule 117 (1) of the Rules. Absence of any time period prescribed under Section 140 of the Act indicate that there is no intention of government to deny carry forward of unutilized credit of duty/tax already paid on the ground of time limit.
High Court has observed in Para 9 that
a) GST is an electronic based tax regime and most of people of India are not well conversant with electronic mechanism

b) Most of us are not able to load simple forms electronically whereas there were a number of steps and columns in TRAN-1 forms thus possibility of mistake cannot be ruled out

c) Various reasons assigned by Petitioners seem to be plausible and we find ourselves in consonance with the argument of Petitioners that unutilized credit arising on account of duty/tax paid under erstwhile Acts is vested right which cannot be taken away on procedural or technical grounds
Reasons for non filing/incorrect filing cited: Following reasons were assigned before High Court (in Para 5) in several petitions for non filing/incorrect filing of TRAN returns
a) Press release showing last date 31.12.2017 instead of 27-12-2017

b) Availability of utilities to upload TRAN-I in September’ 2017 instead of July’ 2017

c) Heavy load upon accountants who were having a number of assesses,

d) Lack of proper knowledge of the computer system

e) Complexity in filling different columns of TRAN-I

f) People dealing with filing TRAN-I electronically are not well conversant with electronic system and on account of multiple columns, the mistake occurred which was unintentional.