TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2008 (8) TMI 71
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....der sought to be appeal against is received by the assessee, the Board or by the Commissioner of Central Excise (now, the Committee of Chief Commissioners or the Committee of Commissioners), as the case may be". The appeal in the instant case has been filed after 441 days from the relevant date. The Revenue, appellant herein, has accordingly filed application for condonation of delay. Sub-section (5) of Section 86 empowers the Tribunal to admit an appeal after expiry of the relevant period if it is satisfied that there was sufficient cause for not presenting it within that period. The facts of the case briefly are these: 3. The impugned order-in-original was passed by the Commissioner of Central Excise as the adjudicating authority on 29-1....
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....ch had become payable to the respondent in terms of the said impugned order-in-original dated 29-12-2006. 5. The case of the Revenue is that the decision taken by the Chief Commissioner on 6-2-2007 was not in accordance with the decisions of the Supreme Court in M/s. K. Raheja Development Corporation v. State of Karnataka, 2006 (3) S.T.R. 337 (S.C.), and the Authority for Advance Rulings in M/s. Harekrishna Developers, 2008 (10) S.T.R. 341, and steps were initiated to review the impugned order of the Commissioner and ultimately on receipt of the opinion of the Chief Commissioners, who were Members of the Committee of Chief Commissioners (by circulation) on 22-4-2008, a direction was issued on 2-5-2008 to file appeal before the Tribunal aga....
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....f Central Excise is to be objected to, that is, appealed against or not, was to be taken by the Board. We were informed in course of hearing that it was the practice in the Department under some administrative Circular in terms of which the Chief Commissioner was required to give his opinion on merit of the case on the basis of which the Board used to take a decision as to whether the order of the Commissioner should be challenged or not. Thus, it was in that context that the file was sent to the Chief Commissioner for his opinion, but, then, he should have recorded his opinion one way or the other and forwarded it to the Board, rather than taken the final decision himself at his own level, accepting the impugned order-in-original of the Co....