Facts of the Case

M/s Habitus HR Solutions Private Limited challenged an unusually large batch of GST demands before the Karnataka High Court: three separate Section 73(9) adjudication orders — dated 21.02.2025, 24.02.2025 and 26.02.2025, each with its own DRC-07 summary — had all been passed for the very same tax period, 2020-21, by different authorities. In addition, the petitioner challenged three further ex-parte Section 73(9) orders for tax periods 2019-20 (dated 29.08.2024), 2021-22 (dated 28.04.2025), and 2022-23 (dated 28.04.2025), all raised after it failed to file replies to the underlying show cause notices, allegedly for want of sufficient opportunity.

Issues Involved

  1. Whether passing three separate adjudication orders under Section 73(9) for the identical tax period 2020-21 is legally permissible.
  2. Whether the remaining ex-parte orders for 2019-20, 2021-22 and 2022-23, passed without a reply from the petitioner, should also be set aside and remitted for a fresh opportunity, and on what terms.

Petitioner's Arguments

  • No sufficient opportunity was granted before any of the orders were passed, resulting in violation of principles of natural justice, and the petitioner did not file a reply or documents leading to the ex-parte orders; if a further opportunity is granted, replies would be filed and the proceedings contested on merits.

Respondent's Arguments

  • Learned counsel for the respondents did not appear to seriously dispute either the impermissible multiplicity of orders for the same 2020-21 period or the ex-parte nature of the remaining three orders.

Court Order / Findings

  • The Court held that passing three separate adjudication orders for the same tax period 2020-21 under the KGST Act was 'clearly impermissible in law' and set them aside outright, remitting that period to the stage of the petitioner submitting a reply to the show cause notice, without imposing any deposit condition.
  • For the remaining ex-parte orders relating to 2019-20, 2021-22 and 2022-23, the Court adopted a justice-oriented approach and set them aside too, but conditioned the remand on the petitioner depositing 10% of the tax amount for each of those three periods before the concerned authority, subject to the final outcome of the proceedings, and directed the petitioner to appear before the authority on a fixed date.
  • Liberty was reserved to the petitioner to file pleadings, responses and documents, to be considered after a proper hearing.

Important Clarification

  • Passing multiple separate adjudication orders under Section 73(9) for the identical tax period is impermissible in law and will be set aside without any pre-deposit condition, since the multiplicity itself is a jurisdictional flaw independent of the merits.
  • By contrast, genuinely ex-parte orders passed for want of a reply are typically remanded only on the condition of a 10% pre-deposit of the disputed tax, distinguishing 'no opportunity due to procedural duplication' from 'no opportunity due to the assessee's own default' in terms of the relief granted.

Sections Involved

  • Section 73, CGST/KGST Act, 2017 – demand provision under which all six impugned orders were passed for successive tax periods.
  • Rule 142, CGST Rules, 2017 – governs the summary of show cause notice and order in Form GST DRC-07.

Decision – In Favour of

The writ petition was allowed in favour of the assessee across all six impugned orders, though with differing conditions — unconditional remand for the duplicated 2020-21 orders, and a 10% deposit condition for the genuinely ex-parte orders for the other years.

Case Details

Court: High Court of Karnataka at Bengaluru. Case No.: Writ Petition No. 25217 of 2025 (T-RES). Neutral Citation: 2025:KHC:43457. Coram: Hon'ble Mr. Justice S.R. Krishna Kumar. Date of Order: 30th October, 2025.

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