Section 129 of the CGST Act, 2017  – Goods in Transit ––- The petitioner challenged order dated April 18, 2022, whereby, the Appellate Authority rejected the appeal preferred against the adjudication order dated October 8, 2021. The petitioner’s vehicle carrying the crane was intercepted by the respondent no.2, and the same was detained on the ground that the validity period of the said E-Way bill had expired. The Advocate appearing for the petitioner submitted that the validity period of the E-Way bill dated September 25, 2021 expired only on October 3, 2021. Since October 3, 2021 was a Sunday and further instructions for extension of the validity period of the aforesaid E-Way bill could not be obtained immediately, the said vehicle was parked at Fulbari bypass when it was intercepted and detained. The court observed that the explanation submitted may be considered to be a bona fide one as the petitioner cannot be said to benefitted in any way by the delay in transportation of the crane. Moreover, the period between expiry of the validity period of the E-Way bill dated September 25, 2021 and the time of interception and consequent detention of such vehicle is not a substantial one and the same cannot be said to be a grave one for the purpose of holding the assessee liable to penalty. The authorities in the orders have not returned any finding that there was any deliberate and willful attempt on the part of the writ petitioner to evade payment of tax.

Held that:- The Hon’ble High Court set aside the orders passed by the appellate authority dated April 18, 2022 as well as the order passed by the adjudicating authority dated October 8, 2021 and directed the respondent to take necessary steps for refund of the amount of tax and penalty recovered from the petitioner pursuant to the aforesaid orders impugned in this appeal and to refund the same forthwith but positively within a period of three weeks.