JEST GST - 450

SEPTEMBER 02, 2026

They Also Make Steel

By Vijay Kumar

YEARS ago, Tata Steel ran a memorable advertisement campaign with the punchline: "We also make steel." The message was simple: they build hospitals, nurture sports, create townships, support research, and, almost as a humble afterthought on the side, manufacture steel.

What the legendary copywriters forgot to add-and what our GST authorities have now helpfully uncovered is:

We also make steel... and when pushed into a corner by a bizarre tax notice, we also make our way straight to the Supreme Court. You don't lose sleep over tax fantasies.

When CGST, Jamshedpur served a Show Cause Notice (SCN) demanding a neat Rs.890,52,10,202/- in tax, a matching Rs.890,52,10,202/- in penalty, and interest, Tata Steel did not look around for a quiet corner to shed tears.

They marched straight into the judicial arena - with the calm confidence of a company that builds cities and occasionally dismantles tax notices.

Anatomy of a Rs.2000-Crore Fantasy

The genesis of this colossal dispute lies in the standard arithmetic exercises conducted by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG).

A Show Cause Notice dated June 13, 2025, alleged that Tata Steel Limited had irregularly availed Input Tax Credit and short paid tax. To make things truly grand, the notice was issued under Section 74, demanding:

- Recovery of Rs.890,52,10,202/-.

- 100% penalty of Rs.890,52,10,202/- under Section 74.

- Interest of hundreds of crores.

Total exposure on the corporate balance sheet: Rs.1,781 crore (and easily crossing Rs.2,000 crore once the interest meter stopped spinning).

Tata Steel submitted detailed replies explaining the plain factual reality: there was no bogus invoice, no shell company, and no missing dealer. The credit was completely genuine - claimed in a subsequent financial year.

The Adjudicating Authority (Additional Commissioner, CGST) chose not to let detailed reconciliation statements spoil an otherwise magnificent demand. On December 26, 2025, an Order-in-Original was passed confirming the entire demand of Rs.890.52 crore, slapping an equal penalty of Rs.890.52 crore, and confirming interest, without bothering to evaluate the company's submissions on merits.

Let us pause and admire the sheer bravado. At this rate, the next audit objection may simply ask Tata Steel to hand over Jamshedpur as a pre-deposit. A demand of Rs.1,781 crore plus interest is not a regular tax assessment; it looks suspiciously like a hostile corporate takeover bid! If Tata Steel had paid that demand without a fight, the department could have proudly updated its own letterhead: "We also make steel... because now we own the plant!"

Call Book and the "Protective" Resurrection

To truly appreciate the bureaucratic choreography in this case, one must examine the timeline recorded by the Supreme Court:

- The SCN Eruption: On June 13, 2025, the proper officer issued the SCN under Section 74, alleging fraud, wilful misstatement, and suppression of facts.

- The Call Book Retreat: On June 27, 2025, the Additional Commissioner sent a formal communication intimating Tata Steel that the SCN was being transferred to the Call Book (the time-honoured departmental deep freezer). The reason? The department itself had contested the CAG audit objection before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC)!

- The Protective Resurrection: Suddenly, the officer realized that the limitation clock under the GST Act was relentlessly ticking away. In a flurry of panic on July 1, 2025, a fresh notice was issued pulling the file out of the deep-freeze to propose a "protective demand" to prevent the matter from becoming time barred.

Sheer brilliance of this departmental drama:

- The officer issues an SCN alleging fraud and suppression.

- The officer then informs the taxpayer: "Actually, we don't believe the audit objection either, and we are fighting against the audit before the PAC, so we are keeping your notice in cold storage."

- The officer then panics and says: "Wait, limitation is expiring! We must pass an order right now as a protective measure, just in case!"

The GST Act provides for self-assessment, provisional assessment, summary assessment, and regular determinations under Sections 73 and 74. Nowhere in the statute does there exist a mythical beast called a "protective assessment," nor does the Act provide a statutory "Call Book" where an officer can pause limitation at his own convenience. As the saying goes, tax authorities cannot simply invent new fauna in the legislative forest.

The Jharkhand High Court

Armed with these absurdities, Tata Steel approached the Jharkhand High Court.

The High Court held that the writ court is not an appellate forum to sift through disputed ledgers of ITC reconciliation.

The petition was dismissed, granting Tata Steel time to avail the statutory remedy of appeal before the Departmental Appellate Authority.

The Supreme Court - Where Steel Meets Statutory Law

Tata Steel had other ideas. Why spend years navigating departmental Commissioner (Appeals) queues-and locking up crores in mandatory pre-deposits-when the entire edifice of the SCN was built on quicksand?

Tata Steel went straight to the Supreme Court in Civil Appeal (2026-TIOL-43-SC-GST, decided on August 25, 2026).

The Additional Solicitor General put up a spirited defence for the department but the Court dismantled his arguments with surgical precision.

We are unable to countenance the argument of the learned ASG that Explanation 2 to Section 74 applies, since even according to him it stood omitted with effect from 01.11.2024.

Equally fallacious is the argument that the proceedings were initiated prior to the expiry of limitation under Section 73. The limitation under Section 73 (10) is also to issue the order under Section 73 (9) and not to issue a notice and sub-section (2) of Section 73 provides for a notice, at least three months before the time limit under Section 73 (10).

The normal period of limitation under Section 73 expired on February 28, 2025.

The Show Cause Notice was issued on June 13, 2025 -more than three months after the normal limitation had already expired! In tax law, that is not a delay - it is a legal extinction.

The limitation in Section 73(10) governs the passing of the final order, and Section 73(2) mandates that the SCN must be issued at least three months prior to that date. An SCN issued in June 2025 was hopelessly time-barred under Section 73. It had to stand or fall entirely on Section 74.

Section 74: You Cannot Sprinkle "Suppression" Like Table Salt

The Supreme Court's ruling strikes at the very root of boilerplate adjudication. The Court laid down four categorical findings:

1. No Independent Satisfaction: An SCN under Section 74 requires the subjective satisfaction of the Assessing Officer. If the department itself is challenging the audit objection before the PAC, the officer could not possibly have formed the requisite satisfaction that tax evasion had occurred.

2. Lip Service is Fatal: The law does not permit mere lip service to the words "fraud," "wilful misstatement," or "suppression". You cannot treat "suppression" like a flavour seasoning and sprinkle it across an SCN to magically transform a time-barred Section 73 dispute into a Section 74 penalty feast. Section 74 is not a magic masala that turns every stale audit objection into a gourmet fraud allegation.

3. Bland Statements are Unacceptable: In Tata Steel's SCN, the officer merely recited a bland statement alleging availment of ITC "without documentary evidence and suppress the facts". (Not only bad law but also atrocious English) Reciting canned phrases without establishing concrete foundational facts of deliberate evasion destroys the validity of the notice.

4. Omitted Provisions Cannot Save the Revenue: The ASG's reliance on Explanation 2 to Section 74 was turned down, since that provision stood omitted from the statute with effect from November 1, 2024.

The Supreme Court set aside the SCN dated June 13, 2025, the Order-in-Original dated December 26, 2025, quashing the entire Rs.890.52 crore tax demand, Rs.890.52 crore penalty, and interest.

In classic judicial balance, the Court granted liberty to the department to initiate fresh proceedings under Section 74 before February 28, 2027-provided they can actually spell out foundational facts in the notice itself.

Translation: "You are welcome to try Round 2, but this time, please remember to bring evidence."

Plight of the Ordinary Assessee

While this judgment is a magnificent victory for jurisprudence, it raises an uncomfortable question:

What would have happened if the assessee had not been Tata Steel?

Tata Steel can afford to hire top senior counsel, secure interim stays, and fight all the way to the Supreme Court. They have the institutional stamina to take on an Rs.890-crore demand without closing down their factories.

For an ordinary taxpayer, the reality is terrifying:

- When an unreasoned SCN arrives with an astronomical demand based on an audit mismatch, the local officer routinely ignores their reconciliations and passes a cut-and-paste Order-in-Original.

- When they approach the High Court, they are turned away at the threshold and directed to the appellate route.

- To file that statutory appeal, they must cough up a mandatory 10% cash pre-deposit, followed by another 10% at the Tribunal stage, locking up working capital and wiping out margins.

- By the time the matter reaches a court capable of recognizing that the SCN was void ab initio, the assessee's business has often folded and their bank accounts have been provisionally attached.

The average taxpayer does not hire senior silks; he folds the notice, puts it under his pillow, and prays for an amnesty scheme. By the time the prayer is answered, the business is already a footnote.

Section 74 is Not an Eraser for Missed Deadlines

The Supreme Court's verdict sends a clear message across all GST commissionerates: Section 74 is an exceptional statutory weapon reserved for intentional tax evaders, not a convenient departmental time machine to resurrect demands that officers forgot to adjudicate within the Section 73 limitation period.

Until field formations learn that copy - paste allegations cannot replace facts, taxpayers will continue to suffer arbitrary demands. But for now, as Tata Steel clears Rs.1,781 crore off its legal ledger, we are left with that timeless slogan:

Steel may be alloyed with carbon, but GST disputes are alloyed with imagination.

The GST architecture assumes that every taxpayer has the stamina of Tata Steel - reality disagrees.

They build bridges, they run institutions, they fight high-stakes GST litigations, and yes-they also make steel!