2024 (12) TMI 621 - HC - Customs

Court Orders Reconsideration of Denied Import License Applications; Policy Committee Given Three Months to Review.

The HC of Bombay quashed the impugned decisions/orders denying the petitioners' applications for import license conditions. It directed the Policy ... Maintainability of petition - availability of alternative remedy - Rejection of petitioners' applications for import license conditions - actual user conditions - HELD THAT:- Admittedly, the PRC did not hear the petitioners before rejecting their applications vide the impugned decisions/orders dated 4 April 2024. At the relevant time, paragraph 2.59 of the Foreign Trade Policy (FTP), 2023, contemplated a hearing before the PRC decided on the issue of relaxation. The same is substantially continued in paragraph 2.60 of the current FTP - The petitioners had already approached the PRC, which rejected their applications without hearing them. On the short ground that the petitioners were required to be heard, and they were not heard, the impugned decisions/orders dated 4 April 2024 set aside and the petitioners’ applications for relaxation/deletion/removal of the actual user conditions in their licenses to the PRC restored. The PRC must hear the petitions/their representatives and decide the petitioners’ applications following law and on their own merits. The High Court of Bombay quashed impugned decisions/orders rejecting petitioners' applications for import license conditions. The court directed the Policy Relaxation Committee of DGFT to hear petitioners and decide applications within three months. The court did not consider merits of the matters. No costs were awarded.