https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=96188 Section 11AC of the Central Excise Act, being a penal provision, applies prospectively and cannot be invoked for short payment of duty completed before its insertion on 28-9-1996. A departmental circular cannot extend the provision to antecedent conduct merely because the show cause notice was issued later, and the appellate authority is not bound by such a circular in exercising appellate functions. The operative principle is that a penal fiscal provision does not operate retrospectively unless the statute clearly so provides, so penalty was not imposable for the prior period. en-us Wed, 16 May 2001 00:00:00 +0530 Sat, 17 Dec 2011 18:24:38 +0530 TaxTMI RSS Generator https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=96188 Section 11AC of the Central Excise Act, being a penal provision, applies prospectively and cannot be invoked for short payment of duty completed before its insertion on 28-9-1996. A departmental circular cannot extend the provision to antecedent conduct merely because the show cause notice was issued later, and the appellate authority is not bound by such a circular in exercising appellate functions. The operative principle is that a penal fiscal provision does not operate retrospectively unless the statute clearly so provides, so penalty was not imposable for the prior period. Case-Laws Central Excise Wed, 16 May 2001 00:00:00 +0530 https://www.taxtmi.com/caselaws?id=96188