The Hindu Business Line : Taxing justice?

IT IS JUST as well that the National Tax Tribunal Bill 2004, introduced in the Lok Sabha the last session, has now been referred to the Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law and Justice for re-examination. In its earlier avatar, the Tribunal, constituted by the previous Government through an ordinance, ran into rough weather on the question of choice of persons to function as its members . . The new Bill incorporates many changes on the appointment of members to the Tribunal and other matters which are no doubt welcome. Nevertheless, a detailed clause-by-clause examination that the Bill would be subjected to by the Standing Committee would not hurt.

In the 2003 NTT ordinance, an order passed by the tax Tribunal was final, and given effect to; civil courts had no jurisdiction, power or authority over any matter falling within the purview of the Tribunal. An appeal against the Tribunal's orders, said the ordinance, would lie only with the Supreme Court. Hence, effectively, the High Courts were relieved of powers to adjudicate on tax matters, except when the issue came up by way of a writ under Article 227 of the Constitution. But it is not inconceivable that tax disputes often invoke issues of fundamental rights and to that extent there could still be some scope for the High Courts to intervene in these matters. Certainly, the stipulation that the Tribunal can evolve its own procedure for adjudicating on the dispute and not be circumscribed by the the Civil Procedure Code could raise questions whether the case was heard in a proper manner and thereby invite writ jurisdiction of the High Court. One must also take into account the possibility that an assessee in his keenness to postpone the obligation to pay taxes under dispute may be tempted to invoke points of writ jurisdiction and these issues may not be extensively debated at the High Court at the admission stage. Certainly the experience of State governments in the matter of constitution of administrative tribunals to adjudicate on staff matters has not been too happy with the latter far from freeing the High Courts of their jurisdiction ended up serving as one more layer in the process of judicial scrutiny of Executive actions.

The answer to the question whether the Tribunal will succeed in relieving the High Courts lies only in the future. In the event, a more fundamentalquestion that arises is whether High Courts themselves cannot be better equipped to hear revenue matters. In this era of technology-backed judicial training and re-training, why can there not be specialised revenue Benches of High Courts? The fear is genuine among members of the Bar that allowing non-judicial persons to represent matters before a tribunal will prove detrimental to the interests of advocates. If chartered accountants are permitted to present cases before a Tribunal, will advocates be allowed to participate in a tax audit, asks the chairman of the Bar Council of West Bengal. The NTT, thus, is threatening to create tensions between two important professions, and this should be avoided at all cost. A national debate on the NTT Bill 2004 brooks no delay.

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