IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA CWJC No.4330 of 2009 SIEMENS LTD., a company registered under the Companies Act, 1956 having its corporate and registered office at 130, Pandurang Budhkar Marg, Worli, Mumbai – 400018 and business address as Plot 6A, Sector 18, Huda, Gurgaon – 122015 and also local address as D Ram Plaza, Exhibition Road, in the town and District of Patna through its Attorney Sri Sudipto Gupta son of Sri Sunil Kumar Gupta resident of P.O. and P.S. Thakurpukur in the town of Kolkata, West Bengal ………………………………………….Petitioner Versus 1. THE STATE OF BIHAR through its Chief Secretary, 2. Department of Finance through the Finance Secretary, 3. Department of Commercial Taxes, Govt. of Bihar through the Commissioner of Commercial Taxes, Bihar, Patna, 4. Commercial Tax Officer, Special Circle, Patna (A.O.) and 5. Deputy Commissioner of Commercial Taxes Special Circle, Patna …………………………………………. Respondents. ----------- For the Petitioner:- Mr. J.P. Khaitan, Sr. Advocate with Mr. Rajeev Ranjan Prasad, Mr. Anuj Berry and Mr. Amod Kumar, Advocates. For the Respondents:- Mr. Lalit Kishore, AAG-IV and Mr. Satyabir Bharti, A.C. to AAG-IV. ----------- 2. 15.04.2009. Heard learned counsel for the parties. Petitioner is a registered dealer under the Bihar Value Added Tax Act, 2005 and also under Central Sales Tax Act, 1956. It is aggrieved by the assessment order passed under the Central Sales Tax Act, 1956 for the Year 2005-2006. Earlier it approached this Court by filing 2 CWJC No. 3258/2009 praying therein for setting aside the aforesaid order of assessment of tax for the Year 2005-2006. It had been urged on behalf of the petitioner that it had filed the returns and the admitted taxes were also paid by it. Since, prima facie, the matter related to the proceedings under the Central Sales Tax Act, which can primarily be decided by the appellate authority, without going into the merit of the matter, we dismissed the aforesaid writ petition vide order dated 19.03.2009 with an opportunity to the petitioner to exhaust the alternative remedy of statutory appeal. The petitioner preferred an appeal before the appellate authority and the appeal has been posted for hearing on 28.04.2009. Present grievance of the petitioner is that demand notice was issued on 22.11.2008 without specification of any date for payment of the amount of tax although the demand notice was received by the petitioner on 13.01.2009. It has also been contended that in the demand notice, an order dated 18.11.2008 was referred to, which was not served upon the petitioner. 3 Therefore, he applied for certified copy of the aforesaid order dated 18.11.2008 and the certified copy of the order could only be received by him on 20.02.2009, which was challenged by the petitioner before this Court by way of filing the writ petition, referred to above. It is the case of the petitioner that after hearing the State counsel the earlier writ petition was disposed of with liberty to the petitioner to avail the alternative remedy of statutory appeal and when the appeal was filed, 25% of the demand was already paid by the petitioner, but without giving a breathing time and without waiting for the ultimate result of the appeal and without reconsidering the prayers made by the petitioner before the tax authorities, the disputed tax amount was recovered by attaching the amount from the Banker of the petitioner in a hurried manner without any reasonable justification. Considering the submissions of the learned counsel for the petitioner and the State, we are of the view that the taxing authorities / collecting officers collected the amount hurriedly without giving a breathing time to the petitioner inasmuch as when an 4 appeal was pending, the petitioner ought to have been given a breathing time but the fact is that by now the demand amount has been collected by the taxing authorities. In the above circumstances, the only order which can be passed is to direct the appellate authority to dispose of the matter positively on the next date of hearing, i.e. 28.04.2009 itself. This order is being passed in presence of the State Counsel. The State counsel should see that the concerned files are sent to the appellate authority before 28.04.2009 so that the appeal can be heard and orders may be passed on the next date, i.e. 28.04.2009 itself. It is made clear that if case is adjourned by the appellate authority without a request from the appellant, the amount so collected should be refunded immediately to the petitioner as the way in which amount was collected from the petitioner. Whether any amount is payable depends on the ultimate outcome of the appeal. If the appeal is allowed, the amount recovered from the petitioner, shall be refunded to the petitioner in the same spate, and in any event within one 5 month from the date of disposal of the such appeal. The writ petition is, thus, disposed of. dk ( J.B. Koshy, CJ ) ( Dr. Ravi Ranjan, J. )