Customs, Excise and Gold Tribunal - Mumbai
Royal Radiators, Poona Radiators & Oil ... vs Commissioner Of Central Excise And ... on 16 August, 2001
ORDER
Gowri Shankar, Member (Technical)
1. The notice issued to the eight appellants before us proposed that they were each part of "Talab Group" and that there was "mutuality of interest" among them. It therefore proposed to demand duty, by denying the benefit of notification 175/86 that each of them had availed of. In the order impugned in the appeal, the Collector has held that the benefit of the notification was not available, and that proceeded to demand duty from each of these units separately.
2. The contention of the common counsel for the appellants is that, since basis for the denial of the notification is that all the goods in question were manufactured by single person, duty could not be demanded from different units. He relies upon the judgment of the Supreme Court in Gajanan Fabrics Distributors vs. CCE 1997 (92) ELT 451 and other decisions of the Tribunal which have followed the ratio of this judgment.
3. The departmental representative contends that the situation is one in which there was one manufacturer who got his goods manufactured from different factories. Therefore he says, there is nothing incorrect in demanding duty separately from each factory.
4. This aspect has not been gone into by the Collector at all, and it will be necessary to see whether the ratio of the Supreme Court's judgment in Gajanan Fabrics Distributors vs. CCE will apply to the facts of the case. Normally we would have done so ourselves. However, counsel for the appellant is right when he says that the Collector has not dealt with the submissions that the appellant before us advanced before him in support of their contention that each of them was in independent entity having an identity distinct from the other. The Collector has not gone into these aspects at all.
5. We are therefore of the view that both these aspects should be gone into. We therefore allow the appeals and set aside the impugned order. The Commissioner shall pass orders, after giving the appellants a reasonable opportunity of being heard on the submissions that have been raised before him in reply to the show cause notice, and keeping in mind the judgments of the courts and decisions of the Tribunal which may be cited before him.