Once a Tribunal decision is accepted, government cannot change its stand in another case
The Supreme Court last week held that once the Government took a conscious decision to accept the principles laid down in a Tribunal decision, it should not be allowed to go back and take an opposite view in another case. The issue was Modvat credit on spares of rope way used for transporting limestone from mines to cement plant. Government had conceded the issue before the Supreme Court in the JK Udaipur case and now the Supreme Court did not allow the government to take the opposite plea as then the law will be in a state of confusion and will place the authorities as well as the assessees in a quandary. Consistency is obviously more important than winning a case.
See our Supreme Court case in Today’s Breaking News.