2018 (8) TMI 112

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....ling the present appeal is hereby condoned. Application stands disposed of. CM APPL. 27175/2018 (for exemption) 2. Allowed, subject to all just exceptions. CUSAA 152/2018 3. Issue notice. 4. Mr. Asbhishek Ghai, Advocate accepts notice. 5. The limited ground and the question of law urged in this appeal is:- "Whether given the concurrent findings and the circumstances established, the imposition of a higher penalty on the appellant was justified?" 6. The facts are virtually not in dispute; the appellant was working for one M/s Alliance Strategies Limited as a Liaison Manager. The said concern was issued notice for clearing goods on the basis of false documents. This culminated in an adjudication order issued by the ....

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....e day-to-day affairs of the notice no.3 and two rubber stamps were also recovered from his cabin which were used for forging the WPC Import licences on his directions. The WPC Import licences were also forged on the directions of Sh. Ashok Gupta who was Chairman of M/s ASL. Sh. Amit Mahajan, who was looking after the Customs clearance of the imported goods was aware of the requirement of WPC Import licences for the import of "Apparatus for Wireless Telegraphy" and was also aware about the forgery made by notice no.3. Noticee no.3 was the actual beneficiary of the above illegal activities. M/s Alliance, S/Shri Ashok Gupta, Chairman, Sanjay Sachdeva, CEO, Sh. Amit Mahajan (Ex-Manager Business Development), Sh. Jaspal Singh Chaudhary and Ms. A....

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....urges that the penalties imposed in this case are ex-facie arbitrary and unreasonable. In the absence of differentiating the role of the three employees i.e. the appellant, Mr. Amit Mahajan and Ms. Anuradha Diwan, he could not be singled out and imposed with a higher penalty of Rs. 40 lacs. 10. The Revenue urges that in the present case there was a difference, inasmuch as, the appellant was responsible for the forgery of a larger number of documents and that the findings indicate that the appellant was involved in forgery and other two employees were coordinating him. 11. This Court is of the opinion that the imposition of different amounts as penalties upon the appellant on the one hand and the other two employees on the other, in th....