Jurisprudentiol - Monday's cases

By Vijay Kumar

Legal Corner Icon — the image was hosted by the publisher and was not captured.Customs

Bituminous Coal or Steam Coal -demand confirmed by classifying Coal imported as "Bituminous Coal" - Grants relief on extended period and penalties.: CESTAT

BOTH coking coal, steam coal and other (2701 19 90) are preceded by "---" and come under other coal preceded by "--". This means according to the General Rules for Interpretation of Tariff, coking coal, steam coal and other have to be treated as sub-classification of ‘other coal'.

As long as the goods are covered by definition as per sub-heading Note 2, such imported coal must be classified under bituminous coal. Only when the specifications laid down in the definition in sub-heading note are not matched, imported coal can be classified under other coal under heading 2701 19 and thereafter under tariff item namely 2701 19 10, 2701 19 20 or 2701 19 90.

Income Tax

Whether when original assessment was completed after scrutiny, AO has powers to resort to re-assessment on basis of Lokayukta's and Newspaper Reports on alleged suppression of sales - YES: ITAT

THE assessee, a public sector undertaking, is engaged in the business of mineral exploration and extraction. Assessee filed its returns for the impugned assessment years and the assessment was completed originally under section 143(3). Subsequently, on the basis of information obtained through news papers followed by the report of Lokayukta of Karnataka received/obtained by the A.O. and also enquiries made in this regard from the Director's of the Company, assessment was reopened under section 147 of the Act by issuing notice under section 148 and reassessment was completed. During the course of assessment proceedings the AO alleged that the assessee has under invoiced its sale price of export which export were made to Japan and Korea and on the basis of the lokayukta report the AO made addition to the returned income of the assessee- CIT(A) affirmed the addition discarding the submissions of the assessee.

The issue before the Bench is - Whether non-disclosure of income by not filing return of income on which the TDS is deducted, can be treated as "undisclosed income" within the meaning thereof in Section 158B(b) under Chapter XIV-B. And the answer goes against the assessee.

Central Excise

Commissioner (A) allowing appeals on merits as well as on ground of time bar - Revenue challenging o-in-a only on merits - since there is no challenge with respect to dropping of duty demands on account of time bar, Revenue appeals are dismissed: CESTAT

THE Bench observed -

"6.1 We observe that there is no challenge by the Revenue with respect to the dropping of duty demands on account of time bar. Since there is no challenge in this regard, the finding of the lower appellate authority has to be upheld with respect to time bar. Therefore, we find no merit in the appeal filed by the Revenue and accordingly the same are dismissed."

One more instance of a frivolous appeal…which appeared as a dormant statistic for an entire decade in those MS Excel worksheets all these years…

See our Columns Monday for the judgements