IMPORT of Raw Sugar and Refined or White Sugar are exempted from Customs duty vide Sl. Nos 37I, 37J and 37K of the table to Notification No. 21/2002 – Cus. As per Clause (m) of the proviso in the preamble to the Notification, this exemption ceases to have effect on or after 1 st September 2011. Now it is extended and will cease to have effect on or after 1 st December 2011.

Notification No. 84/2011-Cus., Dated: September 01, 2011

FTP - Import of Marble from Bhutan - Quota Increased

THE DGFT has amended Licencing Notes 2 and 4 at end of Chapter 68 and Chapter 25 of the Schedule-I (Imports) to the ITC (HS) Classifications of Export and Import Items, as:

Import of Marble, classified under Chapter 25 and 68, from Bhutan shall be subject to a combined annual quota of 10 lakh sq ft(5882 MT). The quota shall come into effect immediately and shall operate on a financial year basis. Monitoring and allocation of the quota shall be made by the Government of Bhutan.

The annual quota for import of marble from Bhutan will now be 5,882 MTs. Previously it was 1847 MTs.

DGFT Notification No. 69(RE–2010)/2009-2014, Dated: September 01 2011

FTP - Epoxide Resin - Unit of Measurement Corrected

THE unit of measurement of Sl nbsp;No. 4 of import list of SION B-149 is at present Kft. Hereinafter, unit of measurement of Sl No. 4 of import list of this SION is now corrected to read as Lbs instead of Kft.

The unit of measurement of import item at Sl No. 4 has been corrected to read as Lbs instead of Kft as Lbs is the standard unit of weight. There is no other change.

DGFT Public Notice No. 76/(RE-2010)2009-2014, Dated: September 2, 2011

CBDT Instructions on Monetary Limits for Appeals - Only Prospective Effect

IN Instruction No. 3/2011 dated 09.02.2011, CBDT has fixed monetary limits for filing appeals in the Tribunal, High Courts and Supreme Court.

CBDT has noted that, “in a large number of cases Hon'ble Delhi High Court has summarily dismissed the appeals filed by the department prior to 09/02/11 on the ground that the tax effect involved was less than the revised monetary limits of tax effect involved prescribed by CBDT Instruction No 3/2011 dt 09/02/11. As per Instruction No 3/2011 the revised monetary limit was applicable only for the appeals filed on or after 09/02/11 i.e the date of issue of Instruction. As per para 11 of the Instruction, it was clarified that the appeals filed earlier would be governed by the old instructions operative at the time of filing”.

Board has also referred to the recent order of the Supreme Court in Surya Herbal case, 2011-TIOL-88-SC-IT, where it was suggested when the matter has a cascading effect, the instruction should not be applied ipso facto. Please see DDT 1684- 02 09 2011.

The Board has reacted immediately and has circulated a copy of the Supreme Court order and instructed the Chief Commissioners and DGs to take immediate steps to file review petition in High Court pointing out the observations of the Supreme Court.

Board also advises the officers not to send any proposals henceforth to file SLP in such cases.

CBDT Letter No. DIT(L&R)-I/SLP/393/2011/4589 Dated: September 02 2011

Customs - On-site Post Clearance Audit (OSPCA) - CBEC Chairman Allays Apprehensions

THE ‘self assessment' introduced in the Finance Act 2011, will bring unwelcome Customs auditors into the premises of the importers and exporters. The Trade has several apprehensions - after all a Government officer is not a very welcome person into your premises, more so an auditor with a magnifying glass to look for faults. Exporters and Importers have expressed fears that this will escalate their costs and more than money, what worries them is the likely harassment and waste of time and energy, especially for the small business units who do not have qualified accounting staff. What they don't understand is as to why they should suffer this intrusive audit, when officers can check all their documents at the port itself and leave them alone after the export or import is completed. After all their interaction with Government Inspectors has not always been anywhere near pleasant.

The Delhi Exporters Association had written a letter to the Chairman, CBEC on this issue.

In a letter to the Association President SP Agarwal, the CBEC Chairman states,

At the outset, I would like to inform you categorically that for the present the scheme will not be applied to exporters.

OSPCA will be implemented in a phased manner beginning only with importers who avail the Accredited Clients Programme (ACP). Other categories of importers would be covered in subsequent phases but even then, taking into account administrative costs of conducting OSPCA and the nature and size of the business it is not intended to cover all importers and the present Customs House Audit shall continue side-by-side with OSPCA.

OSPCA would require an effective Risk Management Systems (RMS) as an essential prerequisite, which is so far not even introduced on the export side.

OSPCA is a globally preferred mechanism to provide greater Customs facilitation in terms of faster clearances to the trading community while at the same time ensuring compliance of the legal provisions. This also allows the development of simplified Customs procedures for such traders.

Another advantage offered by OSPCA is a single point audit combining Customs, Central Excise and Service Tax. It is in this background that in like manner of other Customs administrations, the Indian Customs has proposed to implement OSPCA. This is one vision of Customs, which would take some more time and background preparation for implementation on the export side. The Chambers of Trade & Industry would be definitely consulted before its implementation on export side.

The Chairman expected this would set at rest their concerns that OSPCCA will cause any inconvenience or hardship to the exporting community.

CBEC Chairman's DO Letter DOF No. 131311/2011-Ch(E&C) Dated: September 01 2011.

Is Arvind Kejriwal still an IRS officer?

DDT raised this question on 1st September 2011 and now it is all over the place that the Income Tax Department has sent a notice to Arvind Kejriwal asking him to pay back about Rs. 9 Lakhs. Though Anna's supporters see Government's highhanded behaviour in this action, the fact appears to be that his resignation is yet to be cleared. The Income Tax Department's letter wants him to pay Rs. 9,27,787/- which includes leave salary and repayment of a computer loan with interest.

Kejriwal is in no mood to pay up which he believes is not due and in any case, he says he doesn't have the money. It seems he is flooded with offers from people across the world to pay up his dues, but he feels that the Government's demand is illegitimate and he would like to fight it out.

That doesn't clear the doubt whether he is still in service or not. In any case, the maximum punishment that Government can impose on a delinquent employee is dismissal from service. Perhaps, it makes no difference to him.

ITAT Slams CIT(DR) - Frivolous Arguments and Blatantly False Submissions - Contempt?

IN a recent order the ITAT, Mumbai Bench observed,

We are of the view that the conduct of the learned CIT(A) in addressing Correspondence to the Hon'ble Members in respect of an appeal which has been heard and under consideration for passing orders is improper. It is an attempt to interfere with the due course of any judicial proceeding and tends to interfere with or obstructs or tends to obstruct the administration of justice and as such would be “Criminal contempt¶ within the meaning of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971. The allegations made in the letters dated 23.3.2010 and 24.3.2010 are serious enough to warrant an action seeking protection of the Hon'ble High Court in exercise of its powers to punish for contempt of the subordinate Courts and Tribunals. In our opinion, there cannot be a fitter case for imposition of exemplary costs on the learned Departmental Representative, who in our view, is responsible for such a M.A. and for wasting the time of the Tribunal by raising frivolous arguments and making blatantly false submissions. The cost should have to be recovered from the salary of the delinquent employee, who is responsible for such actions and entry made in his service record on the adverse comments made against the D.R. by the Tribunal. We however refrain from doing so in the hope that such indiscretion would not be repeated in future and also in view of the letter of apology filed by the D.R.

Please See 2011-TIOL-539-ITAT-MUM

All the Prime Minister's (Poor) Men

THE Prime Minister of India is moderately rich with total assets of Rs. 5 Crores. His senior minister and custodian of India's Finance, Pranab Da is worth only 3 Crores, while the poorest minister AK Antony has assets worth just 35 Lakhs. P. Chidambaram is more comfortably placed at 25 Crores. Poor SM Krishna is worth only 4 Crores, but he could afford to stay in a five star hotel in Delhi for about two months – the room would cost half a lakh per day. Kapil Sibal is well placed with 37 Crores. You think rajahs are rich? Jyotiraditya Scindia is worth only 27 Crores, while the ordinary looking Kamal Nath has about 260 Crores and Prafulla Patel is worth over a hundred crores.

P. Chidamabaram owns a cycle worth Rs. 1239/- and keeps good health with a treadmill costing 39,000/-. His wife Nalini Chidambaram owns typewriter worth 24,811/- and CD ROM worth Rs. 9,036/-.

 Jurisprudentiol – Tuesday's cases

Central Excise

Modvat Credit - Capital Goods - Crane, Loader, Rebar Coils, CTD Bars, Cement and TOR Steel used for construction are capital Goods: HC

AS far as the Crane with accessories and Loader are concerned, there cannot be any difficulty in holding that they will come within the items of machinery or equipment used for production or processing of any goods for the manufacture of final products. As far as the other items, namely, Rebar Coils, CTD Bars, TOR Steel and Cement are concerned, as to whether they are capital goods or not, the Tribunal having regard to the law laid down by the Apex Court in Jawahar Mills's case, has liberally construed the above Rule and factually found that these are the items, which are used for the purpose of construction of the plant comprising of concrete foundations, concrete silos for storing raw materials, clinker and cement, pre-heater tower structure, load centres etc.

Income Tax

Whether when partner of assessee-firm fails to raise issue of not signing revised return and assessee pays up penalty imposed, such acts impliedly amount to admission for purpose of prosecution - YES, rules SC

THE issues before the Apex Court are - Whether, for the purpose of prosecution, it is statutorily required of the partner of the assessee-firm to sign the revised return showing higher income and leading to imposition of penalty and Whether when the partner fails to raise the issue of not signing the revised return and the assessee-firm pays up the penalty imposed, such acts impliedly amount to admission for the purpose of prosecution. And the verdict goes in favour of the Revenue.

Customs

Anti Dumping Duty on tyres - Notification No. 12/2010-Cus, set aside: CESTAT

A number of parameters such as capacity, production, capacity utilization, sales, selling prices and profitability of return on investment, wages, employment, productivity etc. recorded an improvement during the periods chosen for injury analysis. In the absence of injury to the domestic industry, the anti-dumping duty merely increases the prices of the imported goods for the domestic consumer and also provides a cushion to the domestic industry to increase their prices. The ultimate sufferer is the domestic consumer and imposition of anti-dumping duty in such a scenario cannot also be considered to be in the public interest.

See our columns Tomorrow for the judgements

Until Tomorrow with more DDT

Have a Nice Day.

Mail your comments to vijaywrite@taxindiaonline.com