2025 (10) TMI 821

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.... MT of stainless steel scrap imported by the appellant under section 111(d) of the Customs Act, 1962 [The Act] and allowed its redemption on payment of Redemption Fine of Rs.40,00,000/- under section 125 of the Act. He also imposed penalty of Rs.10,00,000/- under section 112(a) of the Act. 2. The Appellant is a manufacturer of steel and it imported stainless steel scrap of 304 grade under two Bills of Entry dated 03.12.2014 and 08.12.2014 totalling 500.74 MT of scrap. As per the Foreign Trade Policy framed under the Foreign Trade (Development and Regulation) Act, 1992 [FTDR Act], Para 2.32 of the Foreign Trade Policy and Para 2.32.1 of Handbook of Procedure Volume-I of Foreign Trade Policy, metallic waste and scrap in unshredded, compres....

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....ined at the Visakhapatnam port by an authorized agency viz., M/s Valueguru Chartered Engineers, Surveyors, Valuers, who issued post-shipment inspection certificate as required. The short question to be decided is whether the appellant's scrap was liable for confiscation under section 111(d) of the Act for violation of the aforesaid Para 2.32 of the FTP and Para 2.32.1 of the Handbook of Procedures in not producing the valid pre-shipment inspection certificate from an authorized agency or not. A related question is if the goods should have been confiscated even if they were liable for confiscation under section 111(d) or not and consequently, whether penalty under section 112(a) could be imposed upon the appellant or not. 5. We have heard....

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....lant and learned AR for the Revenue and perused the records. The Commissioner had concluded that since the DGFT had not notified any agency in Turkey to issue pre-shipment inspection certificate, it can only be inferred that no import could be made from Turkey and if any import is made, it is unauthorized under the provisions of the Customs Act, 1962 read with Foreign Trade Policy. We do not find any provision in the FTDR Act or under the Customs Act to come to such a conclusion. It would have been a different case if the DGFT had notified an agency in Turkey for pre-shipment inspection and yet the importer had obtained it from a non-notified agency. The importer cannot be barred from importing scrap from Turkey simply because no agency was....