In Pawan Kumar v. UOI and Anr, the Allahabad High Court denied the plea of the petitioner-assessee to appear before the authority concerned for recording the statement under Section 108 of the Customs Act in the presence of his counsel.
In the present case, assessment proceedings under the Customs Act have been initiated against the assessee. Despite the issue of summons, the assessee refused to appear before the DRI for recording statement under section 108 of the Act. Later, the assessee made a request to appear before the authorities only in the presence of his counsel, which was rejected. Aggrieved by the decision of the authorities, assessee approached the High Court.
The Revenue relied on the decision of the Supreme Court in Poolpandi & Others v. Superintendent, Central Excise & Others wherein the Court rejected the prayer of the petitioner and held that the witnesses had no constitutional right to the assistance of counsel during their interrogation as witness in the enquiry.
Dismissing the petition, the division bench comprising of Justice Ramesh Sinha and Justice Krishna Pratap Singh held that the argument of the assessee has no substance as there is no statutory provision which may allow a person to appear along with his counsel before the authorities concerned while his statement under Section 108 of the Customs Act is to be recorded.
“So far as the power to arrest any person against whom the cognizable offence is made out after recording the statement under Section 108 of the Customs Act then he shall be arrested by the Customs Authorities in view of Section 104 (1) of the Act if evasion or attempted evasion of duty exeeding fifty lakh rupees. The said offence is non-bailable offence as is clear from Section 104 (6) (d) of Customs Act”, the bench also added.
Read the full text of the Judgment below.
