Customs, Excise and Gold Tribunal - Calcutta
Orissa Bridge & Construction ... vs Commissioner Of Central Excise, ... on 30 October, 2001
Equivalent citations: 2002(146)ELT84(TRI-KOLKATA)
JUDGMENT
Archana Wadhwa
1. The issue involved in the present appeal is as to whether the fabrication of Cutting Edge, Plain Shuttering Plates, Well steening Shuttering Plates, Well Curbe Shuttering Plates, Girder Shuttering Plates, Pier Shuttering Plates, Vertical Props and Derricks etc. From Steel angle, MS Plates, MS Sheets, HR Sheets and pipes amount to manufacture and result in emergence of marketable product os as to charge duty of excise on the same. The Additional Commissioner of Central Excise, Bhubaneswar vide his impugned order has confirmed the demand of duty of Rs. 1,32,377.55 (rupees one lac thirty two thousand three hundred seventy seven and paise fifty five only) against the appellants and has imposed a personal penalty of Rs. 16,500/- (Rupees sixteen thousand five hundred only) by holding that the appellants had manufactured the said items and no duty has been paid on the same.
2. We have heard Shri S.K. Majumdar, learned Advocate for the appellants, and Shri V.K. Chaturvedi, learned SDR for the Revenue.
3. As per the process of fabrication on record, the appellants are buying angle iron, MS Plates, MS Sheets, HR Sheets from the open market, the same are cut into specific sizes. They are further bent and welded at the cut/bent end to give the desired shape. Further holes in some items are made by drilling machine. The Adjudicating Authority has held that such activity to be a manufacturing activity by observing that the raw material no longer continues to be in that form or shape after conversion. Plates and sheets, which are the starting materials, get transformed into various products which are having a distinct name, identity, character and use. It is a fact that the sheets, plates, or angle irons cannot be used as cutting HS plates Shuttering or the other items for which purpose they are specifically transformed into new product. Appellants contention that they are doing this for their own consumption is not the deciding factor. For a manufacture to take place, neither standardise mass production nor actual sale in the open market is either essential or relevant. The Hon'ble Supreme Court (Constitutional Bench) in the case of C.C.E., Jaipur v. Man Structurals Ltd. - 2001 (44) RLT 113 (SC) has observed that it was for the Tribunal to determine "whether the structurals that the Department sought to make exigible to excise duty in the various appellants before it, were new, identifiable goods which are produced as a result of manufacture or process and which are marketable". We have already observed that activities undertaken by the appellants results in emergence of new items having distinct, name, character and use. As regards the marketability, we find that the products manufactured by the appellants are movable items and can be used by the interested parties for the same purpose for which the appellants are using it. As such we are of the view that the test of manufacture and marketability stand duly satisfied and the various products are leviable to excise duty.
4. The appellants have also contested the demand on the point of time bar. It is undisputed on record that the appellants had not taken any licence or informed the Central Excise authorities about the manufacture of the goods in question. Appellants activities were detected by the Revenue on 24.8.1987 when their factory was visited by the officers. As such we are of the view that the longer period of limitation was rightly invoked by the Department. In view of the foregoing we do not find any merit in the appeal and reject the same.
(Pronounced)