In the instant case, issue before the High Court was whether an officer (referred as “second officer”) could have initiated fresh proceedings by
issue of DRC-01 and passing order thereafter, when another officer (referred as “first officer”) was seized of the matter and intimation in Form
GSTDRC-01A dated 05.03.2021 was issued to which the appellants had submitted their reply dated 08.03.2021 and the said reply was neither
considered nor rejected and the matter was kept pending. The appellant further stated that he was not aware of the said notice for being uploaded
in the portal and they came to know of the same only after the sum of Rs. 1,84,930/- was paid from their electronic credit ledger and immediately
thereafter, the appellants applied for a copy of the order and thereafter preferred the appeal but by then the period of limitation for filing the appeal
had expired.
The High Court observed that the option which was available to the first officer was to consider the representation/reply and if not satisfied, could
have proceeded to issue SCN under Section 74(1) of the Act which option the first officer did not exercise and the matter was left to linger. Thus,
the preliminary proceedings could not have been initiated by the second officer when proceeding initiated by the first officer for the very same
amount on the very same allegation was not taken to the logical end. It was further observed that when the statutory appeal for the order passed
by the second officer was pending before the appellate authority, the first officer had dropped the proceedings. From the final report of the first
officer, it was seen that the proceedings were closed by the first officer only on 24.01.2023. Thus, for all purposes, it was deemed that the
proceedings initiated by the first officer pursuant to intimation dated 05.03.2021 had attained finality and on the said date, the appeal as against
the proceedings initiated by the second officer was already pending before the appellate authority.
Thus, the High Court considering peculiar facts and circumstances held that the appeal should not be treated to be as time barred