1. Heard Sri Digvijay Tiwari, learned counsel for the petitioner and Sri B.K. Pandey, learned Standing Counsel for the respondents.

2. Present writ petition has been filed against the order dated 10.06.2018 passed by the Assistant Commissioner Commercial Tax, Sector-6, Mathura, by which the petitioner has been assessed to tax for the month January, 2018 under Section 64 of the U.P. GST Act, 2018 (hereinafter referred to as the Act). Against that order, the assessee had filed first appeal that came to be dismissed as beyond time.

3. Short submission advanced by learned counsel for the petitioner is that inasmuch as the petitioner had filed his application for compounding well within time and had complied with the terms of compounding, by operation of law, the assessment of tax liability had to be made under the compounded method and not on the basis of regular assessment.

4. Upon such plea being raised, supplementary counter affidavit had been called from the State. In the supplementary counter affidavit filed by the State in the connected matter being Writ Tax No.134 of 2019, it has been specifically stated by means of paragraph nos. 5 and 6 thereof that, for the period October, 2017 to March, 2018, the assessee had filed application to be admitted to the benefit of compounding and had also paid the compounding fee in accordance with law.

5. Perusal of the order dated 10.06.2018 for the month January, 2018 does not bring out any discussion as to the aforesaid fact.

6. If the contention being advanced by the petitioner is correct that besides filing the compounding application and depositing the compounding fee and it had also complied with the terms and conditions of the compounding scheme, it is difficult to admit of a situation where despite such fact, the assessee could have been taxed in the regular assessment proceedings.

7. It also appears that it may not have been necessary that the assessing officer may himself have had the occasion to examine the admissibility or otherwise of the assessee to the compounding scheme inasmuch as under the Act, it is the ‘proper officer’ who had to examine the admissibility of compounding application (that is admitted to have been filed by the assessee).

8. Accordingly, the order dated 10.06.2018 suffers from an inherent defect, inasmuch as it appears to have been passed without first verifying whether any satisfaction had been reached by the proper officer as to the admissibility of the petitioner to the benefit of the compounding scheme pursuant to his application which admittedly had been filed within time alongwith necessary deposit of compounding fee. The order dated 10.06.2018 is accordingly set aside and the matter is remitted to the assessing authority to pass a fresh order of assessment in accordance with law. The aforesaid exercise may be completed as expeditiously as possible, preferably within a period of six months from the date of production of a certified copy of this order.

9. It is made clear that before proceeding to make any order of assessment, it would be incumbent on the assessing officer to first verify himself the fate of the compounding application admittedly filed by the petitioner for the month January, 2018.

10. Present writ petition stands allowed accordingly.