AI Drafter 
TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2014 (10) TMI 554
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....e quantity of goods of foreign origin were stored and lying at a godown of one Shri Vijay Bhuwania. The said godown was owned by Shri Vinod Agarwal. Accordingly, the Officers of DRI visited the said premises on 28.07.2002 and found that huge quantity of goods of electronics items, like, medicinal powder, ball bearings, packing materials and the road challan of Shri Balaji Enterprises. 4. During the course of investigation, the officers recorded the statement of various persons and verified the antecedent of Shri Vijay Bhuwania, the transporter and the various mobile phones purported to have belonged to Shri Bhuwania, which revealed as under : 4.1 Shri Ram Bilas Mahato, in his statement dated 28.07.2002, stated that he was working as a Darwan of the said godown under the instruction of one Shri Bijay Bhuwania, whose Telephone Number or address was not known to him. He further stated that during his tenure of 8-9 days as Darwan of the said godown, he had seen containers loaded with foreign origin coming to their godown, which were off loaded and stored in the said godown and that subsequently these foreign....
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....o had signed as witnesses to the said Deed. He admitted that he used to collect security deposit from Shri Vijay Bhuwania, and also monthly rent and handed over the same to Shri Vinod Agarwal. He gave mobile number of Shri Vijay Bhuwania, as 9830144797 for contact with Shri Vijay Bhuwania,. He further submitted that he has been told by Shri Vijay Bhuwania, that the said godown would be used for storing import chemical items cleared from Haldia Dock and the goods could be re-packed in similar packet for sale in the domestic market. 4.5 Shri Shyam Sunder Singhal, in his statement dated 3.7.2002, stated that Shri Vijay Bhuwania, who was of short height, dark complexion, healthy, black and having white hair that he took him for the said tenancy and that he had taken Shri Vijay Bhuwania, to the complex/said godown and that subsequently Shri Vijay Bhuwania, contacted Shree Niwal Lahoti, who was exclusive broker of the said complex. 4.6 During the subsequent follow up action, the officers of DRI enquired about the various mobile numbers of Shri Bhuwania from various se....
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....te, Shri Biswajit Mukherjee and Shri Shri Shovendu Banerjee, appearing for Shri Vinod Agarwal, stated that Shri Vinod Agarwal is the Director of M/s Viraj Technocom Ltd. and the petitioner along with his family members are engaged in the manufacturing business by paying Central Excise duty regularly. He submitted that the production unit of the said business was situated in a complex measuring about 10 acres of land, which is called as 'Viraj Ruchir Complex'. He submitted that the said complex has sheds giving to different tenants. He submitted that the premises were meant for manufacture of foreign origin goods and store given on rent. He submitted that Shri Vijay Bhuwania was also occupying one godown. He submitted that some brokers arranged for preparation of Lease Deed and taken signature from the tenants. The ld. Advocate submitted that since the said tenant was listed through these brokers, the petitioner had no dealing with them. It is his submission that in none of the statements, the complicity of the petitioner had featured and the petitioner had rendered all co-operation with the DRI Officials. Further he submitted that the Mobile Number of Shri Vijay Bhuwania given to t....
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....eiterated the findings of the ld.Commissioner. 12. We find that Shri Vinod Agarwal is the owner of the godown, from which the goods of foreign origin, namely, medicinal powder, electronics goods, ball bearings etc. were found to be stored, repacked and transported therefrom. No licit import documents could be produced. On the contrary, it is evident from the statement of Shri Ram Vilas Mahato, Darawan of the Godown, Shri Amit Kumar Gupta, Supervisor of M/s Viraj Technocom (to whom the godown belonged) and Shri Vinod Agarwal submitted that no documents of whatsoever nature regarding their procurement, storage, transportation and issue were maintained at the said godown. It is observed from the order of the ld.Commissioner that lease deed for an abnormal period 22 years was signed between Shri Agarwal as the leaser and Shri Vijay Bhuwania, the leasee without seeing each other, which is not expected from prudent persons. The said lease deed has not been registered, even though law requires registration of the same. Further, the enquiry made at the address of Shri Bhuwania mentioned on the deed, no such address was found. The ld. Advocate for Shri Vinod Agarwal, submitted that telep....
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....ay Bhuwania, were actually found in his name. On the contrary, the Appellant had executed lease deed for his godown with Shri Vijay Bhuwania, who did not exist. To the contention that it was Shri Vijay Kumar Sharma and not Shri Bhuwanaia operating from the said godown, we notice that the Appellant could neither produce nor provided his whereabout before the investigating officers. Moreover, Shri Vijay Kumar Sharma was not found at his premises during visit of the officers. He has also been penalized by the adjudicating officer. In view of this fact, we do not find any merit into the contention of the ld.Advocate that due to fault to investigation, Shri Vijay Kumar Sharma could be let off. We find that the issue of cross examination was examined by the ld.Commissioner. In his/her order, the adjudicating Commissioner who observed that the cross examination of the departmental officers as demanded by the Appellant was not justified, since the noticee has not given an adequate grounds, which could prove in his innocence. On the contrary, the adjudicating Commissioner found ample grounds to implicate the notice. Under the circumstances, non-allowing the cross examination of the person a....