ST - Appellants are engaged in providing commercial training and coaching service and students are awarded certificate/degree by IGNOU - Income so derived is exempted from service tax -Appellant also paying service tax on other educational services - since, both taxable and exempted services were provided they were paying an amount u/r 6(3) of CCR, 2004, however, amount paid to IGNOU was not being included while computing value of exempted services.

Held: Appellant is collecting fees and remitting it to IGNOU on Revenue sharing basis, however, it does not ipso facto lead to exclusion of the amount remitted to IGNOU from the purview of ‘consideration' - as such amount is part of value of service and the whole of the consideration received by appellant is to be treated as ‘value of exempted service', the computation of 5%/6% shall be made on such value as rightly held by lower appellate authority - impugned order upheld and appeal dismissed: CESTAT [para 4] - Appeal dismissed: MUMBAI CESTAT

ST - The assessee is engaged in construction of residential & commercial buildings - At the time of availing Cenvat credit, the assesee was not registered with the service tax department - The assessee availed credit of service tax on pre-dated invoice i.e. date of invoice was prior to date of obtaining service tax registration - The Revenue denied claim for credit on grounds that invoice is a fake one, since the service tax registration no. mentioned in the invoice belonged to the assessee, who obtained registration subsequently.

Held - The service tax registration no. mentioned in the invoice belongs to the service provider & not assessee - Also the issue of non-possession of service tax registration at the time of availing the services and obtained subsequently, does not make the assessee ineligible to avail credit on the invoices issued earlier - The issue is no longer res integra - Following the decision of M/s Bio Industries (P) Ltd. vs CCE & ST Vapi & M/s Vamona Developers (P) Ltd. vs CCE & ST Pune - In the present case, the services were utilized & received by the assessee - Therefore, the service tax paid on such service, is eligible to credit - Hence, the order challenged is set aside: CESTAT (Para 2, 5) - Appeal Allowed: AHMEDABAD CESTAT

ST - Assessee is providing Visa Facilitation Service and Referral Service - Revenue issued SCN to assessee on account of service rendered visa facilitation service and referral service - On the visa facilitation service, assessee has not disputed their service tax liability - Therefore, on that account liability of service tax is confirmed - The assessee has only disputed their liability on referral service and submits that they are not intermediary, therefore, they are not liable to pay service tax post 01.07.2012 - Assessee is nowhere providing services between two or more persons - In fact, assessee is providing services to their clients namely banks/colleges/university who are paying commission/fees to the assessee - Nature of service provided by assessee is promotion of business of their client, in terms, he gets commission which is covered under BAS which is not the main service provided by main service providers namely banks/university - As assessee did not arrange or facilitate main service i.e. education or loan rendered by colleges/banks, assessee cannot be called as intermediary in the light of judgment issued by Advanced Ruling Authority in case of Universal Services India Pvt. Ltd. 2016-TIOL-09-ARA-ST and Godaddy India Web Services Pvt. Ltd. 2016-TIOL-08-ARA-ST - Provisions of Rule 6A of POPS Rules, 2012 has been declared ultra virus by High Court of Delhi in case of Association of Tour Operators 2017-TIOL-1715-HC-DEL-ST - In that circumstance, also the assessee is not liable to pay services for referral service, therefore, issue is answered in favour of assessee.

As regards to export of service, assessee is not an intermediary and providing BAS to their clients, who are located outside India, therefore, the services rendered by assessee duly qualified as export of service in terms of Rule 3 of POPS Rules, 2012 - Therefore, this issue is also answered in favour of assessee - As issue relates to interpretation of POPS Rules, 2012, therefore, extended period of limitation is not invokable: CESTAT - Appeal allowed: CHANDIGARH CESTAT

CX- The assessee manufactures custom built turnkey project items - The assessee was involved in trading activity i.e. goods were directly delivered by the suppliers to the customer site for use in the turnkey project executed by them - On scrutiny of invoices as well as P&L account , it was found that the activity was an exempted service - However, the assessee availed cenvat credit of service tax paid on input services received by them which was common to both the manufacturing as well as trading activity - Besides, Revenue observed that the assessee in his statement has not denied the availment of Cenvat credit on common input services - On the basis of this, duty demand was raised for reversal in terms of Rule 6(3)(b) of CCR along with interest and penalty - The Commr. (A) rejected demand, hence the present appeal.

Held - The assessee during period in dispute has been availing credit on common input services like telephone, internet & courier services - An earlier order pertaining to previous period in dispute, involving the same issue discusses that the assessee did not avail cenvat credit on three common input services - The order further emphasizes that there is nothing on record to shows that assessee has availed credit on these common inputs - Moreover, the statement of employee of the assessee-company highlights the same - Further, labour charges, testing charges, erection & commission charges, repair and maintenance service, GTA, security agency service, forwarding charges, manpower recruitment agency service, professional charges are exclusively used for manufacturing activity and have not been used at all in the trading activity - Therefore, the demand for reversal of cenvat credit is set aside: CESTAT (Para 2, 6) - Appeal Allowed: BANGALORE CESTAT