CESTAT Bangalore grants stay on duty and penalty pre-deposit, citing lack of evidence

The Appellate Tribunal CESTAT, Bangalore granted the stay application for waiver of pre-deposit of duty and penalty amount for the appellant. The Tribunal found that the appellant had established a prima facie case in their favor, as there was a lack of prima facie evidence of contemporaneous import by the Department. The stay on the recovery process was allowed, and the appeal was scheduled for further proceedings.

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Issues: Stay application for waiver of pre-deposit of duty and penalty amount.

In the judgment delivered by the Appellate Tribunal CESTAT, Bangalore, the appellant sought a stay of the operation of the order and waiver of pre-deposit of duty amounting to Rs. 11,62,396/- along with a penalty of Rs. 1,00,000/-, of which they had already deposited Rs. 3,04,823. The appellant had imported 176 Computer Monitors, with the value being increased by 200% based solely on the website price without evidence of contemporaneous import. The Counsel argued that the website price cannot serve as proof of contemporaneous import and presented various evidence to support the correctness of the adopted price, which was allegedly not considered. The appellant requested a waiver for the remaining balance amount.

The learned DR referenced a judgment from the Bombay Bench regarding the consideration of prices from websites, subject to proof of the true identity of the website owner. However, the Tribunal found the cited judgment to be unacceptable on the issues at hand, noting the lack of prima facie evidence of contemporaneous import by the Department. Consequently, the Tribunal concluded that the appellants had established a prima facie case in their favor, having already made a partial pre-deposit. As a result, the stay application was granted with a waiver of pre-deposit and a stay on the recovery process, with the appeal scheduled for further proceedings.

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