LALIT BHAICHAND RAVANI Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Rule. Mr. Pochkhanwala waives service of notice. Rule heard by consent.

(2.) By the present petition the petitioner is challenging the action of the respondents who are the Customs Authorities of Bombay in not allowing the clearance of certain goods described as artificial fur cloth though the bill of entry filed by the petitioner for clearance has been assessed and full duty has already been paid. Admittedly the bill of entry describes the goods covered by that bill as artificial fur cloth. Admittedly again it was so assessed by the authorities and customs duty on the same has assessed by the authority has been paid by the petitioner. The petitioner paid the duty on 20th December 1986. Subsequently, however, when the petitioner went to take delivery of the goods respondent No. 5 in this petition, namely, the Assistant Collector of Customs in charge of Docks, stopped the release of the goods by ordering that the goods should be examined and he would pass subsequently the necessary order.

(3.) The petitioner has now approached this Court under Article 226 of the Constitution and has given the history of the activity of import carried out by him. He has stated that the goods which are under import are the same or similar to the ones which he had imported earlier under the same description, namely artificial fur cloth. To the petition certain opinions given earlier on the nature of the product imported by the petitioner have been annexed. For example, there is a technical opinion dated 12th April 1983 given by the Deputy Chief Chemist and there is also another opinion dated 23rd June 1984 by another officer with designation of Chemical Examine Grade I. Mr. Kantawala appearing in support of this petition has relied upon these opinions not so much for establishing in this case that what has been imported is artificial furcloth but for showing the tests which the authorities have consistently applied while determining whether a particular fur is artificial fur cloth or not. The first opinion of the Deputy Chief Chemist has discussed the nature of what is called the artificial fur and has noted that artificial furs are made with a base of either leather, woven fabric of other material on which the fibre/hairs are gummed or sewed, the material under reference being a knitted fabric in which the piles are introduced during knitting itself and later falls outside the scope of Chapter 43.02. The report in the test memo which was sent to him for CTA classification purposes was to indicate whether it was artificial fur. The Deputy Chief Chemist noted that since the literature indicated the trade acceptance as fur fabric and this being a synthetic or imitation fur fabric, perhaps the description as artificial fur cloth is acceptable for licence purposes as reported by SASMIRA (Silk Mills Research Association). In other words, this office accepted a commodity as artificial fur cloth if the material is a knitted fabric in which the piles are introduced during knitting itself or for that matter during the process of weaving. Similar is the opinion given by the Chemical Examiner Grade I in his report on 23rd June 1984.