In exercise of the powers conferred by sub-section (3) of Section 3-A of the Chhattisgarh Value Added Tax Act, 2005 (No. 2 of 2005), the Chhattisgarh Commercial Tax Tribunal with the previous approval of the State Government, hereby makes the following regulations for regulating the procedure of the Commercial Tax Tribunal and the procedure of the Benches of the Commercial Tax Tribunal, namely:-

REGULATIONS

1. Short title and commencement

(1) These regulations may be called the Chhattisgarh Commercial Tax Tribunal Regulations, 2009

(2) They shall come into force from the date of publication in the official Gazette.

2. Definitions.

In these regulations, unless the context otherwise requires-

(a) "Act" means the Chhattisgarh Value Added Tax Act, 2005 (No. 2 of 2005);

(b) "Authorized representative"

(i) in relation to an assessee./ dealer, means a person duly authorized by the assessee/ dealer under Section 24 of the Act to attend before the Tribunal; and

(ii) in relation to any Chhattisgarh Commercial Tax authority means a party to any proceedings before the Tribunal, any officer not below the rank of Deputy Commissioner or such retired officer not below the rank of Sales Tax Officer/Commercial Tax Officer who has held such office for not less than 5 years duly authorized under sub-section (3) of Section 48 of the Act to appear, plead and act for such authority or an advocate duly enrolled with Bar Council of Chhattisgarh, appointed by the Commercial Tax Department, Government of Chhattisgarh;

(c) "Bench" means a Bench of the Tribunal constituted under Rule 4 of Rules, 2006 and includes the Chairman or any other member sitting singly;

(d) "Chairman" means a person appointed by the State Government under Rule 4(2)(a) of Rules, 2006;

(e) "Form" means a form appended to Rules, 2006, with suitable modification wherever necessary shall be used for the purpose of the notices to be issued by the Tribunal;

(f) "Full Bench" means a Bench constituted under the Rules;

(g) "Government" means the Government of Chhattisgarh;

(h) "Legal Practitioner" shall have the same meaning as assigned to him in the Advocate Act, 1961 (No. 25 of 1961);

(i) "Member" means member of the Tribunal; appointed under Rule 4(2)(b) of Rules, 2006;

(j) "Rules" means the Chhattisgarh Value Added Tax Rules, 2006;

(k) "Secretary" means the person who is, for the time being, discharging the functions of the Secretary of the Tribunal;

(l) "Section" means the section of the Act;

(m) "State" means the State of Chhattisgarh;

(n) "Tribunal" means the Chhattisgarh Commercial Tax Tribunal established under sub-section (1) and sub-section (3) of Section 3 of the Act and includes, where the context so requires, a Bench exercising and discharging the powers and functions of the Tribunal;

(o) "Words and expressions" used but not defined in these Regulations shall have the meanings respectively assigned to them in the Act and the rules made thereunder.

3. Sittings of Bench.

The Bench shall also sit at such place other then head quarters, as may be authorized by the Government.

4. Office Hours.

(a) Office hours of the Officers and the staff members of the Tribunal shall be same, as that of other offices of the Chhattisgarh Government.

(b) Working hours of the Tribunal for hearing the cases shall be between 11.00 A.M. and 5.00 P.M. With recess between 1.30 P.M. And 2.30 P.M. Timings may however be suitably amended by the Chairman as and when necessary.

5. Powers of Bench

(1) A Bench shall hear and determine such appeals and applications made under the Act as the Chairman may by general or special orders direct,

(2) Chairman may inspect the records kept by the assessing officer and the appellate authority.

6. Powers and functions of the Secretary.

(1) The Secretary shall have the custody of the records of the Tribunal and shall exercise such other functions as may be assigned to him under these regulations by the Chairman.

(2) Subject to any general or special order of the Chairman the Secretary shall have the following powers and duties, namely :-

(i) to receive all appeals, reference applications and miscellaneous applications as well as other documents including applications for early hearing or for adjournment;

(ii) to endorse on such appeals and applications the date of receipt for the purpose of calculating limitation;

(iii) to scrutinize all appeals and applications so received to find out whether they are in conformity with rules and regulations;

(iv) to point out defects of such appeals and applications to the parties requiring them to rectify by affording reasonable opportunity and if within the time so granted defects are not rectified, to obtain the orders of the chairman, for return of the appeals and applications;

(v) to check whether the appeals or applications are barred by limitation and if so, to intimate the party and place the matter before the chairman, for orders;

(vi) subject to the directions of the Chairman or the member, to fix the date of hearing of the appeals and applications and direct the issue of notices therefor;

(vii) to ensure that sufficient number of cases are fixed before the Bench or Benches under directions of the Chairman or member, as the case may be;

(viii) to bring on record legal representatives, in case of death of any party to the proceedings;

(ix) to verify the service of notice or other processes and to ensure that the parties are properly served after obtaining orders of the Bench whenever required for substitute service;

(x) to requisition records from the custody of any authority;

(xi) to allow inspection of records of the Tribunal;

(xii) to return the documents filed by any authority on orders of the Bench;

(xiii) to consolidate the appeals relating to the same dealer /assessee or the same issue or for any reason on the direction of the Chairman or Member;

(xiv) to fix cases out of turn on the direction of the Chairman or Member;

(xv) to certify and issue copies of the orders of the Tribunal to the parties;

(xvi) to grant certified copies of documents filed in proceedings to the parties in accordance with the rules/regulations;

(xvii) to grant certified copies of the orders of Tribunal for publication in accordance with rules / regulations;

(xviii) to segregate cases to be heard by single member and fix them for hearing separately;

(xix) to obtain orders of the Bench on applications for withdrawn of appeals and applications and put up before the Bench.

7. Preservation of record.

The disposed of records shall be preserved for a period of fifteen years.

8. Destruction of record.

In the last fortnight to every quarter, disposed of records finally, whose period of preservation expired shall be destroyed.

9. Language of the Tribunal

The language of the Tribunal shall be Hindi and English;

10. Filing of appeal.

Every appeal and revision shall be filed in the Tribunal in accordance with the rules made under Rule 57 of the Rules and reference, rectification and miscellaneous applications should be filed in paper book according to the provisions of Chhattisgarh Value Added Tax Act, 2005 with addition that it shall specify the name and address of the respondent or non applicant below the name and address of the appellant/applicant as the case may be.

11. Memorandum of appeal shall accompany with

Every memorandum of appeal shall be in triplicate and shall be accompanied by three certified copies of the order appealed against, three copies of the assessment order, three copies of the grounds of appeal before the first appellate authority and three copies of the statement of facts, if any, filed before the said appellate authority.

12. Filing of affidavit

Where a fact, which cannot be borne out by, or is contrary to the record is alleged, it shall be stated clearly and concisely and supported by a duly sworn affidavit but bench may direct any party to file an affidavit in any matter during the proceeding.

13. Grounds which may be taken in appeal

No additional ground shall be set forth by the appellant which was not taken in first appeal.

Provided that the appellant may file an application stating the reasons to permit to take additional ground and in such case, after hearing the other party, the Tribunal may permit if satisfied.

14. Authorizing a representative to appear.

As provided in Section 24 of the Act the persons who are entitled to appear before taxing authorities shall also be entitled to appear before the Tribunal unless otherwise directed by the Chairman of the bench concerned.

15. Preparation of paper books, etc.

(1) If the appellant or the respondent, as the case may be, proposes to refer or rely on any document or statement or other papers on the file of or referred to in the assessment or appellate orders, he may submit a paper book in triplicate, one paper book for each of the respondents containing such papers duly indeed and paged at least two days before the date of hearing of the appeal along with a proof of service of a copy of the same on the other party at least a week before, provided, the Bench may condone the delay and admit the paper book containing copy of such statements, papers and documents as it may consider necessary for the proper disposal of the appeal as it deems fit at the cost of the appellant or respondent as the case may be.

(2) The papers referred to in sub-regulation (1) above must always be legibly written or typed written in double space or printed. If Xerox copy of a document is filed, then the same should be legible. Each paper should be certified as a true copy by the party filing the same or his authorized representative and indexed in such a manner as to give the brief description of the relevance of the document with page numbers and the authority before whom it was filed.

(3) When any party is permitted to file additional evidence under regulation 17 of the regulations, then the same shall be filed by way of a separate paper book containing such particulars as are referred to in sub-regulation (2) accompanied by an application stating the reasons for filing such additional evidence.

(4) The parties shall not be entitled to submit any supplementary paper book, except with the leave of the Bench.

(5) Paper/paper books not conforming to the above regulations are liable to be ignored.

16. Continuation of proceedings after the death or adjudication of a party to the appeal.

Wherein, a dealer whether he be the appellant or the respondent to an appeal dies or is adjudicated insolvent or in the case of a company being wind up, the appeal shall not abate and may if the dealer was the appellant, be continued by and if he was the respondent be continued against the executor, administrator or other legal representative of the dealer or against the assignee, receiver or liquidator, as the case may be.

17. Production of additional evidence before the tribunal

The parties shall not be entitled to produce additional evidence either oral or documentary except with the leave of Tribunal, however if the Tribunal requires any document to be produced or any witness to be examined or any affidavit to be filed to enable it to pass orders or for any other substantial cause or if the commercial tax authorities have decided the case without giving sufficient opportunity to the dealer to adduce evidence either on points specified by them or not specified by them, the Tribunal, for reasons to be recorded, may allow such document to be produced or witness to be examined or affidavit to be filed or may allow such evidence to be adduced.

18. Mode of taking additional evidence.

Such documents may be produced or such witness may be examined or such evidence may be adduced as the Tribunal may direct.

19. Additional evidence to be submitted to the Tribunal.

If the document is directed to be produced or witness examined or evidence adduced before any commercial tax authority, he shall comply with the direction of the Tribunal and after compliance send document, the record of the deposition of the witness or the record of the evidence adduced to the Tribunal, and his finding or report as directed.

20. Adjournment of appeal

The Bench of the Tribunal may on such terms and on such cost, as it thinks fit, at any stage, adjourn the hearing of the appeal.

21. Order to be signed and dated.

The order of the Bench shall be an writing and shall be signed and dated by the chairman or member or the members constituting it and affixed by the seal of the Tribunal.

22. Order to be communicated to the parties and the Commissioner of Commercial Tax.

The Tribunal shall, after the order is signed, cause it to be communicated free of cost to the parties to the appeal and the Commissioner of Commercial Tax.

23. Proceedings before the Tribunal.

The proceedings before the Tribunal shall be open to the public. However, the Tribunal may, in its discretion for reasons to be recorded in writing, direct that the proceedings before it in a particular case will not be open to the public.

24. Issue of summons/notice.

(1) Every summons/notice shall be in writing and in triplicate and shall be signed and sealed by the Secretary or by such person as empowered by him in this behalf and it shall specify the time and place where the person summoned is required to attend, and also to give evidence or to produce a document.

(2) A summons/notice to produce documents may be for the production of certain specified documents or for the production of all documents of certain description in the possession or power of the person summoned.

25. Mode of service of summons/notice.

Subject to other provisions of these regulations, whoever is summoned to appear before the Chhattisgarh Commercial Tax Tribunal to give evidence shall appear at such time and place as mentioned in the summons for this purpose, and whoever is summoned to produce a document, shall either appear to produce it, or cause it to be produced at such date, time and place:

Provided that wherever these regulations are silent on the subject regarding the summons, the provisions of Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (No. V of 1908) shall apply.

26. Service of order.

Provisions of Rule 56 shall apply.

27. Application.

Wherever these regulations are silent on any subject, the provisions of the Rules shall apply.