Customs - Rules of Origin - CBEC Instructions
INDIA has signed Free/Preferential Trade Agreements / Comprehensive Economic
Partnership/ Cooperation Agreement (FTA/CEPA/CECA) with a number of countries and trading blocks.
Rules of Origin are notified under each of the Agreements which require the importer to, inter alia, make a claim for preferential tariff at the time of importation, and submit a Certificate of Origin (COO) in the prescribed form.
The Rules of Origin and the Operational Certification Procedures (OCP) are spelt out in the customs non-tariff notifications, which inter-alia, lay down the format of the certificate of origin,the period of validity, manner of obtaining the certificate and the procedure for verification of origin. One of the usual conditions for accepting the certificate is that it should be signed by the authorized signatories whose name, signature and seal have been communicated by the FTA partner country through agreed channels. At present, the signatures and seals are received by the Board, either directly from the government of the FTA partner country or through the Department of Commerce. These specimen seals and signatures are circulated to all Chief Commissioners by the Customs V Section of the Board by email. The specimen seals and signatures are also forwarded to DRI, which circulates the paper copies to all Chief Commissioners.
Board has tasked the Directorate General of Systems to build an online repository on ICES for storing the signatures/seals to facilitate comparison by the assessing officers. DRI has been tasked with uploading the data in the database.
In the interim, it is proposed to continue with the existing system of circulation of the signatures and seals. The Board desires that in each Custom House/Commissionerate, an officer of the rank of JC/ADC may be designated to act as the custodian of the specimen signatures/seals. Should a doubt regarding genuineness or authenticity of a signature/seal/format of certificate arise in the course of assessment by the proper officer, he shall verify the with specimens held by the designated JC/ADC.
In case the specimen seal/signature is not available with the designated officer of the Custom House, the issue may be referred to Director (ICD), CBEC for verification. Requests for verification in all other types of cases must be sent to the Board with the approval of the jurisdictional Principal Commissioner/ Commissioner. The reference for verification must contain legible copies of the Certificate of Origin, invoice and the Bill of Lading/Airway Bill.
CBEC Instruction No. 31/2016 in F. No. 20000/4/2011- IC (ICD)., Dated: September 12 2016