Kerala High Court Holds GST Portal Upload As Valid Service, Dismisses Petition Filed After Two Years
Manu Sharma
23 Jan 2026 5:43 PM IST
On 19 January, the Kerala High Court dismissed a writ petition filed by Abhinaya Digital Solutions challenging a GST demand order, holding that uploading an order on the GST portal constitutes valid service and that a challenge filed more than two years after the order suffers from unexplained delay.
Justice Ziyad Rahman A.A. declined to entertain the petition against an assessment order passed under the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017, seeking recovery of input tax credit claimed on closing stock as of 30 June 2017.
The Court observed:
“Due to delay and lapses from the petitioner in invoking the statutory remedies or Constitutional remedies for a period of more than two years, I do not find any justifiable reasons to entertain this writ petition.”
The petitioner had challenged an order under Section 73 of the CGST Act, by which her TRAN-1 application claiming transitional input tax credit was rejected, and the credit availed was demanded back along with interest and penalty. One of the principal grounds urged was that the application had been rejected without granting an opportunity of being heard.
The petitioner contended she was unaware of the order, only coming to know of it on receipt of an arrear notice. The Court, however, noted that the assessment order had been passed on 28 December 2023 and explicitly addressed the TRAN-1 claim, yet the petitioner did not file a statutory appeal or approach the Court within a reasonable time, filing the writ petition over two years later.
Rejecting the claim of non-receipt, the Court observed that the order had been uploaded on the GST common portal. Referring to Section 169 of the CGST Act, it held that service of any decision, order, or notice via the portal is deemed valid, a position already upheld by a Division Bench of the High Court.
The writ petition was dismissed accordingly.
Case Title: Dhanyamol V v. State Tax Officer & Ors.
Case Number: WP(C) No. 113 of 2026
Citation: 2026 LLBiz HC (KER) 14
For the Petitioners: Sri. V. Devananda Narasimham, Advocate
For the Respondents: P.R. Sreejith and Reshmitha R. Chandran