Customs duty imposed on import of wheat

By Vijay Kumar

THE Australian Newspaper 'The Weekly Times' reported on 5th August that the wheat exports from Australia to India are expected to dry up following plans by the Indian government to slap a 10 per cent import duty on the grain.

And the Indian Government imposed the 10% import duty on 7th August.

Wheat was charged to nil duty as per Sl. No.34 of the Table to the Notification No. 12/2012-Cus. Now it is made 10% till 1st day of April 2016. Why did the Government impose this duty?

Indian traders are importing huge quantities of quality wheat from Australia in preference to the low quality wheat sold by FCI. And FCI is holding huge quantities of low quality wheat that has to be disposed of. And so they don't want any imports.

Already Australian wheat has reached Indian ports and many shipments are on the way - they will now suffer the 10% duty.

Did the Customs collect the newly imposed 10% on Friday to Sunday? After all the notification was effective from Friday and the Customs Commissionerates have no way to know about this as the Australian newspaper.

Notification No. 44/2015-Customs, Dated: August 7, 2015