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2018 (9) TMI 397 - CESTAT MUMBAIPenalty u/s 112(a) of Customs Act, 1962 - detection of ‘mobile memory cards and adaptors’ in Baggage - Smuggling - Baggage Rules - Held that:- The appellant was neither a passenger nor was he present at the time of interception of the ‘memory cards and adaptors’. He, however, operates a business in trading of similar items and had some business relationship with one of the domestic passenger - admittedly, the statement of Jitendra Sharma was entirely retracted and that a plausible explanation to exact revenge by implicating the appellant has also been suggested. Even if the statements are exculpatory and the retracted statement is discounted, the corroborative evidence in the form of the letter dated 20th August 2007 from the travel agent cannot be discounted. It is clearly mentioned therein that the appellant is a regular customer who used to book tickets on phone and used to send Mohamed Sohail to collect the tickets. There are no flaws in the finding of the original authority that a conclusion can be derived from the contents of a statement, retracted though, in conjunction with material evidence of purchase of the tickets that were utilized by others whose complicity in the smuggling has not been controverted - appeal dismissed.
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