No Customs Duty on Personal Jewellery: Delhi HC [Read Order]

The Delhi High Court recently quashed an Order passed by the Joint Commissioner of Customs levying penalty on the Petitioner for not declaring personal jewellery while passing through Customs.

The Petitioner, Saba Simran filed a Writ Petition before the Delhi High Court praying for quashal of the Order and detention receipt by the Joint Commissioner of Customs, along with the  release of their gold ornaments that had been detained at Delhi International Airport during their travel from Dubai.

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It was averred that the Petitioner had travelled from Bengaluru to Dubai on 22.05.2023 for a film shooting and had returned to Delhi International Airport on 25.05.2023. While attempting to pass through the green channel, the Petitioner was intercepted by a Customs Officer who retrieved one plastic box containing 3 gold bangles, weighing 130 grams and 15 gold beads (parts of bracelets) weighing 89 grams from the Petitioner.

The gold ornaments were seized and quantified as per the valuation limits in the Baggage Rules, 2016.

The Division Bench of the Delhi High Court comprising Justice Yashwant Varma and Justice Ravinder Dudeja observed that even though the Customs Act, 1962 defines ‘import’ as the act of bringing an article into India from a place outside India, the same may not be straightly applicable to the bringing into India of “personal effects”, which could also include jewellery and ornaments which are personal items.

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The Bench made reference to the Baggage Rules, 1998 which exempted duty on ‘used personal effects, excluding jewellery’; however the Ministry of Finance had issued a clarificatory Circular No. 72/98-Customs dated 24 September, 1998 which affirmed that ‘personal effects’ would also include ‘personal jewellery’.

Though the 1998 Rules were amended by virtue of the Baggage (Amendment) Rules, 2006, the stipulations regarding the entry of articles free of duty remained the same except for an increase in certain monetary limits. Furthermore, it was observed that Rule 2(vi) of the 2016 Rules is in line with the concept of ‘used personal effects’ as in the 1998 Rules.

Read More: Kerala HC directs Conditional Release of Seized Gold and Gold Items in-spite of Customs Appeals by Revenue

Referencing the judgment of the Kerala High Court in Vigneswaran Sethuraman vs. Union of India (2014), the Division Bench held that the Respondent Joint Commissioner of Customs had misconstrued the scheme as well as the objectives of the 2016 Rules. In light of the observations, the Delhi High Court proceeded to quash the order-in-original dated 21.09.2023 while remitting the matter back to the Joint Commissioner for reevaluation, bearing in mind the observations and outcome of the present case.

To Read the full text of the Order CLICK HERE

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