Conflicting inspection reports on machinery age require reasoned appraisal before confiscation, penalty, and importability decisions can stand.

Where imported second-hand machinery was claimed to be within the EXIM Policy age limit, the adjudicating authority had to appraise the importer's foreign expert certificate and the department's rival visual inspection report and record cogent reasons for preferring one over the other. The failure to give adequate reasons or properly examine the material evidence meant the confiscation and penalty could not stand on the existing record. The matter was therefore required to be reconsidered afresh on proper evidence and in accordance with natural justice.

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Issues: Whether the order of confiscation and penalty could stand when the importer produced a foreign expert's certificate on the age of the machinery and the adjudicating authority relied on a rival visual inspection report without giving adequate reasons for preferring one report over the other.

Analysis: The imported second-hand machinery was claimed to be less than ten years old and therefore freely importable under the applicable EXIM Policy. The importer relied on a foreign expert's certificate, while the department relied on a visual inspection report. Where both sides relied on competing visual assessments, the adjudicating authority was required to give plausible reasons for rejecting one report and accepting the other. The order did not disclose such reasons, and the evidence produced by the importer was not properly examined.

Conclusion: The confiscation and penalty could not be sustained on the existing record, and the matter required fresh adjudication after proper consideration of the evidence.

Final Conclusion: The impugned order was set aside and the dispute was remitted to the Commissioner for de novo adjudication in accordance with law and natural justice.

Ratio Decidendi: Where conflicting visual inspection reports are relied upon to determine the importability of goods, the adjudicating authority must record cogent reasons for accepting one report and rejecting the other, and failure to properly appraise material evidence warrants remand.

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