2010 (6) TMI 369

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....onverted to coastal run. Bills of entry were filed and duty liability with interest was discharged. The vessels reverted to foreign run again on 11-4-03 and 22-9-03 whereupon the inventory of ship stores remaining on board at the time of reversion was drawn up. Thereafter the bills of entry which were provisionally assessed at the time of conversion to coastal run were finally assessed on 12-7-04 and 13-7-04. The appellants filed refund claim for Rs. 35,808/- in the case of first vessel and 8,36,741/- in the case of second vessel. The refund claims have been rejected on the ground that the same have been filed beyond the time limit of six months from the date of finalization of provisional assessment and also on the ground of unjust enrichm....

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.... assessment when the meaning of expression relevant date given under Section 28 of Customs Act is considered, which provides that in a case where duty is provisionally assessed under Section 18, the date of adjustment of duty after the final assessment thereof would be the relevant date. Thus in the case of both Section 27 and Section 28 of Customs Act, 1962, the department is required not only to finalize the assessment but also carry out a final adjustment of duty. Obviously there cannot be an adjustment where the assessee is liable to pay differential duty as a result of finalization of provisional assessment. It can be in the form of a show cause notice or a letter which can be followed up by a show cause notice if the assessee does not....

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....e lower authorities have gone on the assumption that date of finalization of bill of entry would be relevant for the purpose of determination of limitation and the relevant date. This is not legally correct. 3. In view of the above discussion, we consider it appropriate that the matter should be remanded to the original adjudicating authority who should decide the date of finalization of assessment, the date of adjustment and the date on which refund claim should have been filed and the date on which the same has been filed and thereafter decide the eligibility. 4. The appellants also had made an alternative claim that they have to be considered as government and therefore the time limit for filing refund claim is one year....