TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
1975 (12) TMI 81
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....m 87 of the Indian Tariff Act, 1934 instead of ICT 39 an Item meant for charging duty on raw rubber. The custom duty charged under Item 87 is much more than the one chargeable under Item 39. A countervailing duty under Item 15A of the Central Excise Tariff in accordance with the Central Excises and Salt Act, 1944 is also charged if the article imported is not treated as raw rubber. On five consignments of V.P. Latex imported by the appellant in the year 1968 customs duty was charged under Item 87 by the Appraiser pursuant to his order of assessment. Since he was an officer lower in rank than the Assistant Collector of Customs the appellant filed five applications before the Assistant Collector under Section 27(1) of the Customs Act, 1962, h....
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....plications on the ground that they were filed out of time. The appeals to the Appellate Collector of Customs filed under Section 128(1)(b) of the Act failed. The appellant took the matter in revision to the Central Government under Section 131. The revisions were dismissed by the Central Government by their order dated November 29, 1972 sating therein : "The Govt. of India have carefully considered the reasons advanced by the petitioners for their failure to prefer the claims for refund within the time stipulated under Section 27 of the Customs Act, 1962, but see no justification to interfere with the appellate orders. The revision applications are, therefore, rejected." The appeals were filed from the said order after obtaining speci....
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....for determination by us is whether the applications for refund were filed out of time. 5. Section 27 reads as follows : "27(1) Any person claiming refund of any duty paid by him in pursuance of an order of assessment made by an officer of customs lower in rank than an Assistant Collector of Customs may make an application for refund of such duty to the Assistant Collector of Customs before the expiry of six months from the date of payment of duty : Provided that the limitation of six months shall not apply where any duty have been paid under protest. Explanation - Where any duty is paid provisionally under Section 18, the period of six months shall be computed from the date of adjustment of duty after the final assessment thereo....
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....s of the appeals before us to substantiate the plea of payment under protest, but none of them helps the appellant. We may refer to only two of them. The appellant wrote a letter on February 8, 1968 to the Assistant Collector of Customs, Madras making out a case therein that V.P. Latex was assessable to duty under Item 39 I.C.T. Finally in this letter a protest was made for the assessment of duty under Item 87 on V.P. Latex imported by the company in the past. This letter was written before the five consignments in question were imported and duty paid thereon. The protest, therefore, embodied in the letter aforesaid was not in respect of any of these consignments. A letter written on July 15, 1968 was a letter written at a point of time whe....