Supreme Court issues Notice to Govt. on a plea challenging 18% GST granting Mineral Exploration and Mining Rights

Supreme Court Issues Notice to Govt. on a plea challenging 18% GST granting Mineral Exploration and Mining Rights

The Supreme Court issues notice to Govt. with an appeal challenging 18 percent GST on granting services of mineral investigation and mining rights.

A group of firms involved in mining and crushing operations came forward to file the petitions. The petitions requested that the disputed circular has extensive consequences that every mining company has been accountable to pay Goods and Services Tax (GST) on the amount of royalty paid for mining operations in as much as the royalty paid by such companies is already a kind of tax being paid to the government. More importantly, which question, royalty being a tax, is pending adjudication before a nine-judge bench of the Supreme Court.

It is advised that the Petitioners have been paying GST on mining royalty to the state government in agreement with the respective mining lease deeds.

Under given circumstances, this leading issue within a batch of matters, is pending before the Supreme Court titled as Udaipur Chambers of Commerce and India SLP (Civil) No. 37326 of 2017 vide Order dated 11th Jan 2018. The stay has been granted on service tax payment on mining royalty till further order. Similarly in various tagged matters, stay has been granted to mining companies for service tax payment on mining royalty.

The three-judge bench of Justice D. Y. Chandrachud, Justice Surya Kant and Justice Vikram Nath while listing the petition on 4 January 2022 asked the advocate for the Petitioners, Mr. Kartik Seth. It was regarding the issue of maintainability and why have these writ petitions been filed in the Supreme Court directly under Article 32 of the Constitution of India.