CENTURY RAYON Vs. COMMISSIONER OF CUSTOMS (IMPORTS)

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By this Appeal under Section 130 of the Customs Act, 1962 (for short "the said Act"), an exception is taken by the appellant - assessee to the judgment and order dated 17th May, 2006 by the Customs Excise and Service Tax Appellate Tribunal, West Zonal Bench at Mumbai (for short "Appellate Tribunal").

(2.) The appellant - assessee exported quantity of 25.902 MT of Rayon Tyre Yarn (for short the "said Tyre yarn") to a Company in Germany. According to the case of the appellant-assessee, during the course of converting/processing, the said Tyre yarn was found to be defective. A part of the said Tyre yarn was used and was converted to Tyre Cord by a company in Germany. It is the case of the appellant that during the said process, only a part of the said yarn was used and remaining part was kept as it is in the original packing. It is the case of the appellant that on receiving a complaint on this aspect, the appellant deputed its technical personnel to the plant of the company in Germany with a view to ascertain the true facts. After finding that the complaint of the company was genuine, the appellant agreed to take back the entire consignment. Accordingly, the appellant filed a bill of entry for home consumption by describing the goods as under:

(3.) According to the case of the appellant, report of the Dock staff was that the goods reimported consisted of 8430.40 kgs of Rayon tyre yarn, 13981.00 kgs of Rayon Tyre Cord, 452 kgs of Yarn waste and 3041 kgs of packing materials. The claim of the appellant on the basis of proviso to subsection (1) of Section 20 of the said Act was that the benefit of the proviso will be available and no duty will be payable on reimported goods. The contention of the appellant was not accepted as regards last three items of the reimported goods and therefore, on the said three items, duty was paid under protest. Pursuant to the prayer made by the appellant for grant of refund, a show cause notice was served to the appellant calling upon the appellant to show cause as to why the claim for refund should not be rejected. The allegation in the show cause notice was that the goods originally exported had undergone a change in their form. It is alleged that in absence of the failure to establish identity at the time of importation, benefit of the proviso could not be made available.