FRICK INDIA LTD. Vs. CCE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THESE two appeals bearing Nos. E/2749/87 and E/1890/90 filed by the appellant company have been remitted to us since the earlier orders passed by this Tribunal in Final Order No. 83/2000 -A dated 18.02.2000 and in Final Order No. 147/2000 -A dated 21.12.2000 were set aside by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Easland Combines Coimbatore v. The Collector of Central Excise, Coimbatore, in Civil Appeal No. 2693 of 2000 . While remitting the matters to this Tribunal, the Hon'ble Court made the following observation in C.A. No. 302 -303 of 2002, dealt with thereunder:

(2.) THE grounds and backgrounds in both these appeals are similar. The first appeal (No. E/2749/1987) emanates from show cause notice dated 31.03.1986 which relates to the period 1.3.1981 to 24.08.1985. The appellant were charged here with mis -declaration of the assessable value of several items with an intention to evade payment of central excise duty. It was alleged that the appellant had declared less value for excisable goods while diverting the major portion of the assessable value towards the value of non -dutiable accessories, which enabled them remove their excisable goods without payment of central excise duty due on them. Specific instances were brought to light by the Department to show that completely assembled packaged units were despatched but the appellant were issuing two sets of bills i.e one for the product, and the other for the accessories. Bill with the series HOPJ used to indicate the value of the product along with the excise duty payment was shown to the excise authorities for verification purposes, audit etc. and the other bills with series HOPJA issued simultaneously for the same consignment with inflated, enhanced and overloaded value for the accessories also included the packing charges and forwarding charges. The packing and forwarding charges were not assessed to duty in the second bill. This bill was also not revealed to the Department and the fact was concealed from the Department.

(3.) IT was thus alleged that the appellant deliberately undervalued the goods and paid less excise duty to the Government with the malafide intention of willful mis -statement and suppression of facts by not declaring the real value of the goods in order to evade the payment of central excise duty leviable on the real value of the goods.