Disciplinary action should be taken against the concerned officers for losing original documents

The Hon'ble Bombay High Court in Sheshnath Adyaprasad Singh v. Union of India [Writ Petition Nos. 9626 & 9627 of 2024 dated August 09, 2024], interim order was granted where documents including original purchase invoices submitted by the Assessee in response to the Show Cause Notice ("SCN") was lost by department while Assessee required those documents to substantiate its claim and though in affidavit Commissioner accepted loss of documents, a contrary letter was issued to Assessee stating that department had not received any document, department should show cause as to why disciplinary action should not be taken against concerned officers.

Facts:

Mr. SheshnathAdyaprasad Singh("the Petitioner"),had submitted the original purchase invoices and other documents to the GST department vide letter dated July 09, 2019 in response to SCN.

The Petitioner, vide letter dated October 03, 2023 had requested for returning the documents/files containing purchase invoices that were handed over. However, the Petitioner never received any reply to this letter dated October 03, 2023 and consequently, none of the documents were made available due to which Petitioner was not able to reply to the SCN.

The Respondents issued few letters to the Petitioner in February 2024 and March 2024 to state that they have not received any documents referred to in petitioner's letter dated July 9, 2019.

The Respondents had not promptly replied to Petitioner's letter dated October 3, 2023 and waited till February or March 2024 to reply.

Two orders dated July 15, 2024 ("the Impugned Orders") were passed to grant an interim stay.

Hence, aggrieved by the Impugned Orders, the Petitioner filed the present writ petition.

Issue:

Whether Disciplinary action should be taken against the concerned officers for losing original documents?

Held:

The Hon'ble Bombay High Court in Writ Petition Nos. 9626 & 9627 of 2024 held as under:

• Observed that, multiple efforts have been made to find the documents mentioned in the letter dated July 9, 2019 but the same are not traceable in the office record. The Department is totally silent as to whether they personally searched the documents, did not say who searched for the documents and did not further state that whether any disciplinary action has been taken against the concerned officer for losing the documents. Those documents were not relied upon but the fact is that those documents are required by Petitioner to respond to the action being taken against Petitioner. Therefore, by losing the original documents which have been admittedly taken from Petitioner, respondents have prejudiced the rights of the Petitioner.
• Held that, the Department's statements, first admitting receipt of documents in an affidavit, then stating to the contrary that documents were received but lost in an official letter raised serious concerns of misconduct. Therefore, the Hon'ble High Court stayed the operation and recovery under the Order-in-Original until final disposal.
• Directed that, this order be also forwarded to the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC), Principal Secretary, Department of Revenue, Ministry of Finance, Government of India and to the Chief Commissioner for necessary action.

OFFICIAL JUDGMENT COPY HAS BEEN ATTACHED