2018 (6) TMI 1348

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....eferred to as 'Meenakshi') are manufacturers of detergent and detergent soaps. Pursuant to investigation carried out by the Directorate General of Anti-Evasion, Chennai a Show Cause Notice dt. 20.11.1992 was issued to the petitioners. Initially, the Commissioner had demanded duty of Rs. 4,68,92,035/- and on appeal, the Hon'ble Tribunal has remanded the matter for fresh adjudication. The Commissioner of Central Excise vide his Order-In-Original No. 16/2000 dt. 30.05.2000 has demanded a sum of Rs. 14,90,706/- and imposed penalty of Rs. 5,00,000/-. He has also confiscated detergent cakes valued at Rs. 32,000/- and Van and gave an option to redeem the same on payment of fine of Rs. 20,000/- and Rs. 50,000/-. 2. Today when the matter came up ....

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....nce his reliance on a retracted statement is ill founded and therefore unacceptable. b) SMSW has produced a Licence dated 8th January 1988, issued by the Commissioner, Ariankuppam Commune Panchayat, Pondicheery 605 007. On scrutiny, it is seen that the same was issued for "Manufacture of Detergent, Washing powder, cleaning powder, Detergent powder with 11.5 H.P" which goes to show that SMSW has been issued with a licence for manufacture of cleaning powder (scouring powder) with the aid of power only. (c) SMSW relies heavily on the letter dated 17.11.1992 issued by the Superintendent of Central Excise, Pondicherry Range II directing them to discharge duty on scouring powder on provisional basis under Rule 9B of the Central ....

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....st 25 years that have passed by, the matter has come up to the Tribunal on three earlier occasions, which has resulted in the proceedings having been adjudicated on four occasions. The fact that the appellants could not produce satisfactory evidence of their claim in respect of the exempted clearances in all these proceedings leads us to the obvious conclusion that no such clearances would have taken place during the period of dispute. For this reason, we do not find any infirmity in the aforesaid conclusions of the adjudicating authority. In the event, the plea made by the appellants on this score does not pass muster and is, therefore, rejected. 5.5. In the case of Aruna Industry, the appellant has contended that the LAB procured by tr....

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.... are different from and other than the 15 units and SMSW. It is worth quoting para 62 of the SCN at this juncture. "62. "In addition to the above, M/s Aruna Industry had purchased LAB in the account of their Sales Depot at Cuddallore and also in the name of M/s Rama Balaji Traders, a trading unit owned by Shri M. Chocklingam which is reported to have ceased its operations. Details of total purchase of LAB made by these units are furnished in Annexure XVII. Since this is only a trading unit dealing in detergent soaps, LAB was purchased by M/s Aruna Industry for manufacture of Acid Slurry. This method is adopted by M/s Aruna Industry to suppress the production of Acid Slurry and clear the same clandestinely to M/s SMSW for manufactur....