By TIOL News Service

AHMEDABAD, JUNE 09, 2014: THE appellant was regular importer of the Stainless Steel Cold Rolled Coils. The said products were imported by the appellant during the period 2009-12 and appropriate customs duty was discharged. All the Bills of Entry during the relevant period were finally assessed by the lower Authorities after physical examination of the goods. Govt of India on an application made by the domestic industries, initiated an investigation for imposition of anti dumping duty on Cold Rolled Flat Products of Stainless Steel and definitive anti dumping duty were imposed by Notification No. 14/2010-customs dtd 20, Feb., 2010. Subsequently, after initiating a midterm review, the designated authority issued corrigendum which was notified by Notification No. 86/2011-Customs wherein the scope of the subject goods was expanded as also extending the tolerance limit of the products under consideration on which anti-dumping duty was imposed.

The Customs authorities seized the consignments imported by the appellants for which Bills of Entry were filed on 14.10.2011 and released the same provisionally. After conducting investigation and recording various statements, DRI issued the Show Cause Notice to main appellant as well as the other appellants. The Adjudicating Authority after following due process of law, held against all the appellants. Vide the impugned order, the Adjudicating Authority, confiscated the goods which were seized and provisionally released, imposed redemption fine in lieu of the release of goods, confirmed anti-dumping duty on the consignments imported earlier alongwith interest, and also imposed penalties.

It is the contention of the appellant that the notification had specifications of the products sought to imported for imposition of anti dumping duty, i.e., "Cold Rolled Flat products of Stainless Steel exported out of country and of specific exporter" if the same has the width of 600 mm up to 1250 mm. Also, the Notification excludes grades IP Ferritic Grades EN 1.4512. It is their submission that the main appellant had imported only the Cold-Rolled Flat products of Stainless Steel during the material period of Grade EN 1.4512.

After hearing both sides, the Tribunal held:

The dimensions which were declared by the appellants on the products which were imported were indicated as the products width more than 1250 mm. The seized goods were put to examination and on examination it was found that the goods were having maximum width as 1278-1279 mm. If the physical examination of the goods as indicated having average width of the goods imported by the appellant is 1278-1279 mm, it is a clear indicator that the said products were not covered for imposition of definitive anti dumping duty.

The designated authority while recording the findings on definitive anti-dumping duty had specifically excluded the Cold Rolled Fiat products of Stainless Steel of grade EN 1.4512 from the purview of the definitive anti dumping duty. The corrigendum issued (deleting EN 1.4512 from the excluded category) by the designated authority and notified by the Dept of Revenue in the Gazette of India (Extraordinary) on Feb. 2012 can be made applicable only for the goods for which bills of entry are filed on or after Feb. 7, 2012. The said corrigendum cannot be applied retrospectively for the goods which have already landed into and for which appropriate Bill of Entry were filed for the reason that an importer who has imported goods on which no anti-dumping was leviable cannot be saddled with the same by issuing a corrigendum and that too in a full fledged mid-term review done by designated authority.

(See 2014-TIOL-971-CESTAT-AHM)