'ANNEXURE 63' not typed on Centre of page - LUT rejected
THE whims and fancies of babudom know no limits. An Assistant Commissioner of Central Excise rejected an LUT - Letter of Undertaking because the caption ‘Annexure 63' was typed on the left hand top of the page and not at the centre top of the page! The same Assistant Commissioner rejected another LUT because it was made in favour of the Assistant Commissioner and not ‘Assistant Commissioner or Deputy Commissioner as the case may be'.
Export is a national priority and all officers of the Government are expected to support, promote and facilitate exports, but can you imagine responsible officers of the Department putting spokes with trivial objections?
Now there is nothing like an official "Annexure 63" - this is the number given by a publisher for his convenience and this Assistant Commissioner who must be having a copy of the book must have taken it as sacred Veda from which an inch of change is sacrilege. This is not even a statutory form. Government has allowed the facility of LUT instead of bond for manufacturers for export of goods. This LUT is valid for a period of one year and after the expiry of one year another LUT can be filed.
This Assistant Commissioner has just joined the department and he has already learnt how to harass his assessees. Didn't NACEN teach him that he is a public servant and not a master?
This point was raised recently in the RAC meeting of a Central Excise Zone and the Department replied -" the concerned Division has been instructed so that such confusions do not arise ."
We only hope the assessee concerned does not face the music.