Contemporaneous import documents prevail over suspicion-based misdeclaration claims when no expert evidence rebuts the declared scrap description.

Contemporaneous import documents describing heavy melting scrap, including the bill of lading, invoice, pre-shipment inspection certificate and high-sea sale papers, were treated as the primary evidence of the goods' description. Physical examination alone was found insufficient to establish misdeclaration where the Department produced no expert evidence that the cargo was serviceable or that the declared description was false. The absence of a registered branch office issuing the inspection certificate did not, on these facts, justify denial of relief, especially where the import predated the clarification relied upon by the Department. On that basis, confiscation and penalty were held unsustainable and relief was allowed.

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Issues: Whether the imported consignment of heavy melting scrap was liable to confiscation and penalty on the grounds of alleged misdeclaration, and whether the absence of a registered branch office issuing the pre-shipment inspection certificate justified denial of relief.

Analysis: The import took place before the clarification relied upon by the Department regarding branch offices issuing pre-shipment inspection certificates. The goods were accompanied by contemporaneous commercial documents describing them as heavy melting scrap, including the bill of lading, invoice, pre-shipment inspection certificate, and high-sea sale papers. No war material or explosive material was found in the cargo. The Department relied only on physical examination to say that part of the consignment was re-rollable scrap, but produced no expert evidence to establish that the goods were serviceable or that the declared description was false. In these circumstances, the documentary record and the absence of expert proof supported the importer's claim.

Conclusion: Confiscation and penalty were not sustainable, and the importer was entitled to relief.

Ratio Decidendi: Where the contemporaneous import documents consistently describe the goods as scrap and the Department fails to adduce expert evidence to displace that description, confiscation and penalty cannot be upheld merely on a physical inspection-based suspicion of misdeclaration.

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