Statutory limitation for customs recovery cannot be bypassed by revision, and a barred notice may be challenged at threshold.

A general revisional power under the Sea Customs Act could not be used to reopen and recover an allegedly erroneous refund after the express three-month limitation for recovery had expired. The specific limitation in the recovery provision governed, and the broader supervisory revision power could not override it without making the statutory time bar ineffective. A writ petition under Article 226 was also maintainable at the notice stage because the proposed recovery was jurisdictionally barred from the outset; a party need not wait for completion of an unlawful proceeding before seeking relief.

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Issues: (i) Whether the revisional power under Section 190A of the Sea Customs Act could be used to reopen and recover an amount allegedly erroneously refunded, notwithstanding the three-month limitation prescribed by Section 39 of the Sea Customs Act; (ii) Whether a writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India was premature when the Customs authorities had issued only a show-cause notice to commence such recovery proceedings.

Issue (i): Whether the revisional power under Section 190A of the Sea Customs Act could be used to reopen and recover an amount allegedly erroneously refunded, notwithstanding the three-month limitation prescribed by Section 39 of the Sea Customs Act.

Analysis: Section 39 was treated as the specific substantive provision governing recovery of duties short-levied or erroneously refunded, and it required a notice of demand within three months from the relevant date, which in the case of erroneous refund was the date of refund. Section 190A was held to be a procedural revisional provision conferring general supervisory power for a period of two years, but not one that could override or enlarge the express limitation attached to the recovery mechanism in Section 39. The more specific statutory restriction could not be displaced by invoking the general revisional power, as that would render the limitation in Section 39 nugatory.

Conclusion: The recovery proceedings were barred by limitation under Section 39, and Section 190A could not be used to circumvent that bar. The point was decided against the Revenue.

Issue (ii): Whether a writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India was premature when the Customs authorities had issued only a show-cause notice to commence such recovery proceedings.

Analysis: The notice was challenged at the threshold on the ground that the authorities lacked jurisdiction to proceed at all, because the claim sought to be revived had already become irrecoverable by lapse of time under Section 39. Where the proceeding itself is without jurisdiction and the notice is a definite step in aid of an unlawful recovery, the affected party need not wait for a final order and may seek preventive relief under Article 226. The Court distinguished mere challenge to an ordinary show-cause notice from a case where the initiation of the proceeding is itself incompetent.

Conclusion: The writ petition was not premature. The challenge to the notice was maintainable, and the point was decided against the Revenue.

Final Conclusion: The Customs authorities had no power to reopen the time-barred refund claim by resorting to revision, and the notice initiating the recovery proceedings was rightly quashed.

Ratio Decidendi: A general revisional power cannot be invoked to defeat an express and specific statutory limitation period governing recovery of duty or refund, and a notice issued in aid of a jurisdictionally barred proceeding may be challenged at the threshold under Article 226.

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