1997 (4) TMI 254

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....ld second hand machines of various models to importers at Ludhiana and Delhi by affixing new number plates and manipulating the Sl. Nos. and year of manufacture so as to enable its import under OGL. Pursuant to the said information, the import documents of the appellants were taken over and scrutinised and it was found that although the year of manufacture was shown to be 1982, there was an abnormal difference in the Sl. Nos. of the machines stated to have been manufactured in the same year. Therefore, the department was under the reasonable belief that the buyer might have manipulated the year of manufacture in order to circumvent the conditions of OGL as stipulated in para 64(2) of the Import Policy AM 1985-88 which provides that such mac....

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....ation of the imported knitting machines and proposing imposition of penalty under Section 112. The Adjudicating authority passed separate adjudication orders in which he held that the machines (two machines in the case of M/s. Rajah Hosiery and 6 machines in favour of M/s. Lalsons) were liable to confiscation; since the goods were not available for confiscation because they had been released provisionally against an order, he ordered that an amount of Rs. 1 lakh should be recovered each from both the importers in lieu of confiscation. He also imposed a penalty of Rs. 50,000/- each on both the appellants. 5. Shri H.O. Arora, learned Counsel appearing for the appellants, takes me through the impugned order and submits that the Charter....

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....rnished only in respect of 1 out of 2 machines imported by M/s. Rajah Hoisery and 3 out of 6 machines imported by M/s. Lalsons. Therefore, the report can be taken to relate to only 1 machine imported by M/s. Rajah Hoisery viz. Machine No. 282645221982 and three machines imported by M/s. Lalsons namely machines bearing Sl. Nos. 242623871982, 84881982 and 48671982. Since the department has satisfactorily established that these four machines were manufactured more than 7 years before the date of their import into India, I hold that the Collector has rightly confiscated these machines. However, same finding cannot be made applicable to the other machine imported by M/s. Rajah Hosiery namely machine No. 272557721982 and other three machines impo....