Check out GST Practical Guides | Registration, Suspension, Cancellation & Revocation of Cancellation, a comprehensive guide to the practical aspects of GST law, detailing registration processes, special provisions, amendments, suspensions, and cancellations in an easy-to-understand language. It is amended by the Finance Act 2023 and is developed by the Goods & Services Tax Practitioners' Association of Maharashtra.
Registration is the most fundamental requirement for identification of taxpayers to ensure tax compliances in the economy. Registration under the GST Law implies obtaining a unique number from the jurisdictional tax authorities for the recognition as an authorised entity for tax purposes and for having a verification mechanism for its compliances. Without registration, a person can neither collect tax from his customers nor claim any input tax credit paid by him.
Under GST, the registration requirements are linked with the levy of tax. The taxable event under GST is ‘supply’. Every person who undertakes a transaction amounting to supply, has to register himself under the GST Law, if his aggregate turnover in a financial year exceeds the threshold limit prescribed. Hence, the registration provisions not only bear significance for compliance purposes, but also for identification of person liable to be pay tax.
In one of the landmark case of Mathuram Agarwal vs. State of Madhya Pradesh (1999) 8 SCC 667 (SC), it was held by Hon’ble Supreme Court of India that:
“The Statue should clearly and unambiguously convey the three components of the tax law i.e.
- the subject of the tax,
- who is liable to pay the tax and
- the rate at which the tax is to be paid.
If there is any ambiguity regarding any of these ingredients in a taxation statue then there is no tax in law. Then, it is for the legislature to do the needful in the matter.”
It is uncomplicated from above that one of the limbs of levy is identification of the person who is liable to pay tax and in case of GST, the same is linked with the person who is liable to obtain registration.
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