The Supreme Court has directed the Union of India/GST Council to issue an advisory to States regarding implementation of the system of electronic (digital) generation of a Document Identification Number (DIN) in indirect tax administration.
The States of Kerala and Karnataka have already implemented it. The court appreciated the two States for that, saying it was “laudable”.
A Bench led by Justice M.R. Shah further impressed upon the States “to consider to implement the system for electronic (digital) generation of a DIN for all communications sent by the State tax officers to taxpayers and other persons concerned so as to bring in transparency and accountability in the indirect tax administration at the earliest”.
The order came in a petition filed by Pradeep Goyal, represented by advocate Charu Mathur, to direct the States and the GST Council to take necessary steps to implement a system for electronic (digital) generation of DIN for communications sent by the state tax officers to taxpayers and other persons concerned.
The petition had also sought a direction to the GST Council to consider and take a policy decision in respect of implementation of the DIN system by States. In view of the implementation of the GST and as per Article 279A of the Constitution, the GST Council was empowered to make recommendations to the States on any matter relating to GST, it had said
The petitioner had argued that GST Council could also issue advisories to the States for implementation of the DIN system, which “shall be in the larger public interest and which may bring in transparency and accountability in the indirect tax administration”.
In the order, the court noted that the Centre had taken a decision and as such had implemented the DIN system of Central Board of Direct Taxes and on and from October 1, 2019 as every CBDT communication would have to have a DIN.
Implementing a system for electronic (digital) generation of a DIN would prevent any abuse by the departmental officers of pre-dating communications and ratifying actions by authorisations subsequently made out in the files, the court agreed with the petitioner.
The Bench noted that even the Prime Minister of India had earlier asked the Department of Revenue to come up with specific measures to “ensure that the honest taxpayers were not harassed and served better”.
