The Gujarat High Court directed the Customs Authority to Consider applications for Provisional Release of goods as Seizure Memo is disputed.
The petitioner, M/s Hazel Mercantile Ltd entered into a contract with Aureole Trading (U.A.E) for supply of product Naphtha. The shipment of Naphtha was loaded from the port at Oman and was imported at the port Kandla. As per the Contract the subject goods were shipped through Delta Shipping And Trading LLC on Vessel MT Tuna vide 7 Bills of Lading.
The case of the authorities is that the goods that were imported purportedly as Naphtha, on examination at the Custom House Laboratory at Kandla were found to be “ Natural Gasoline Liquid”. In the opinion of the authorities it appears that the imported goods have been mis-declared and mis-classified as Naphtha instead of Natural Gasoline Liquid and can only be imported by State Trading Enterprises in view of the Foreign Trade Policy. The petitioner not being an importer holding the status of a State Trading Enterprise, could not have imported Natural Gasoline Liquid.
The division bench headed by the Chief Justice Vikram Nath and Justice Biren Vaishanav held that the entire issue of the seizure memo being disputed on the basis of test reports essentially being in the realm of disputed questions of facts the court did not proposed to exercise jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India in favour of the petitioner and entertain the petition in context of the prayers made herein.
The court directed the petitioner to press for the applications for provisional release made under Section 110 the Customs Act, 1962 and direct the respondents to decide the applications so made pending before it, in accordance with law within a period of four weeks.
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