TMI Blog2017 (7) TMI 151X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ical distance between the entry/exit hubs and the location of the importer/exporter, as well the complexities of procedures, warrants professional representation that may not be available in-house. Consequently, in a statute that is essentially concerned with the power to levy tax, with procedure for recovery of tax and with enumeration of offences and penalties, special provision have been enacted to accord legal status, and thereby to exercise statutory control on certain institution. It is inconceivable that the licensing authority is so base as to forfeit the high reputation of the organisation that is presided over warranting intervention by another authority howsoever eminent. It, therefore, does not behove upon a collegial body/individual, not acknowledged in the Regulations, to take upon itself the mantle of supervision and thus insinuate itself into a process not contemplated either in section 146 of Customs Act, 1962 or by the Regulations framed thereunder. For us to permit recourse to the general provision in section 129D of Customs Act, 1962 merely because of the absence of such a remedy in the Regulations and for convenience of some executive authority would be t ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... n proceeded against under the penal provisions of Customs Act, 1962 but were exonerated by the adjudicating authority. We also find in the impugned order that the Commissioner of Customs has noted the report of the inquiry authority which had held all the four charges to be proved but, nonetheless, accepted the contention of the licensee that the employees had acted on their own in the absence of any evidence to establish that the agent was cognisant of the alleged activities. 4. Considering the contents of inquiry report and the specific finding of the competent authority in the impugned order, we find no reason to interfere with the penalty that was imposed upon the agent. More so, as the role of the employees of the agent in the clearance of ineligible goods has been sufficiently established. 5. We find that the appeal of the Commissioner of Customs has its origins in the disinclination on the part of a Committee of Chief Commissioners to accept any penalty other than that of revocation of the license as adequate. The proceedings concluded in June 2006 and the agent has been continuing to operate within the jurisdiction of the Commissioner of Customs since then. To visit t ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... vailable in-house. Consequently, in a statute that is essentially concerned with the power to levy tax, with procedure for recovery of tax and with enumeration of offences and penalties, special provision have been enacted to accord legal status, and thereby to exercise statutory control on certain institution. 9. Among the manifold provisions that make up the Customs Act, 1962, two are concerned with persons other than importers and exporters, viz. section 3 that designates classes of officers and section 146 relating to custom house agents/custom brokers; the first to create the limbs for the exercise of various powers conferred by the sovereign legislative organ and the latter to acknowledge the legality of the facilitation mechanism that is universally recognised as an adjunct of customs operations. While officers are servants of the State, regulated by instruments particular to them, agents are not any less save that their origin is conceived by this statute itself. Owing to the narrow and limited purpose of their role, it was left to section 146 of Customs Act, 1962 to provide for manner in which they are brought into being, their actions are regulated and are to be erased ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... he question that would naturally arise in consequence is whether, in the absence of a special provision, the general mandate of the sovereign legislature can, as Learned Authorised Representative appeared to suggest, be resorted to. If the existence of a special provision would erase the recourse to the general provision, as it does for customs house agent/custom broker, the deliberate exclusion of an appellate remedy in this special provision should also erase the scope for recourse to the general provision. This inference is derived from the conferment of the power upon the entity empowered to notify the Regulation by a specific mandate in section 146 of Customs Act, 1962 to designate an appellate jurisdiction. If the sovereign legislature had intended that interchangeability of appellate provision between that in the Regulations and in chapter XV of Customs Act, 1962 was not anathema and that a perceived void in the Regulations could be bridged by recourse to the general provisions, there would have been no need to include the devising of an appellate scheme in the scope of the regulation framing powers. The Central Board of Exercise Customs has, in its wisdom, decided that th ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... be usurped by any other authority, howsoever well-placed it may be. Insofar as creatures are concerned, the creator is the be-all and end-all , the Alpha and the Omega . There can be no doubt that, with the operation of agent/broker being limited to functioning within the custom house, it is the Commissioner of Customs who has the highest stakes in its effective and efficient functioning; no Commissioner of Customs would consider that objective to have been achieved with the continued tolerance of a delinquent agent/broker. It is, therefore, inconceivable that the licensing authority is so base as to forfeit the high reputation of the organisation that is presided over warranting intervention by another authority howsoever eminent. It, therefore, does not behove upon a collegial body/individual, not acknowledged in the Regulations, to take upon itself the mantle of supervision and thus insinuate itself into a process not contemplated either in section 146 of Customs Act, 1962 or by the Regulations framed thereunder. 14. This brings us to the contradistinction with disputes relating to collection of revenue. The power to legislate taxes is vested in the sovereign legislative b ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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