TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2024 (7) TMI 1468
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....deposit furnished by it was forfeited and a penalty of Rs. 50,000/- was imposed on it. The finding of the Commissioner in the impugned order is that the appellant had violated Regulations 1(4), 10(d), 10(e) and 10(n) of Customs Brokers Licensing Regulations, 2018 [CBLR 2018]. Therefore, in exercise of the powers conferred under Regulation 14 and 18 read with Regulation 17 (7) of CBLR, the above action was taken against the appellant. 2. The facts of the case which led to the issue of the impugned order are that the Commissioner received an offence report in the form of show cause notice [SCN] dated 31.03.2021 from the Joint Commissioner of Customs (Preventive), New Delhi that the exports by M/s A-One Design Interiors Private Limited [expor....
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....go who acted as the customs broker in the export by M/s A-One Design. M/s Planet World Cargo was another customs broker owned by Shri Satender Singh whose licence was suspended since 2018-2019. Shri Tilak Raj, the G-Card holder of M/s Planet World Cargo joined as the customs broker of the appellant. The finding of the Commissioner that the appellant had sublet its licence to M/s Planet World is based on the statements of Shri Satender Singh of M/s Planet World Cargo and of Shri Tilak Raj according to which M/s Planet World Cargo obtained the KYC documents of the exporter and completed all the customs formalities using the appellant's licence. Therefore, it concluded that the appellant had sublet the licence to M/s Planet World Cargo. What i....
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....the first place, the customs broker has no role in deciding the transaction value of the goods which is a subject matter of negotiation between the buyer and the seller. It also has no role in determining the assessable value of the goods which has to be either self-assessed by the exporter or re-assessed by the proper officer. Therefore, unless any specific evidence is found against the customs broker in any particular case, customs broker cannot be held responsible for either the value or the description of the goods or the quantity of goods imported or exported. 8. Regulation 10(e) requires the customs broker to ascertain correctness of any information which he imparts to client with respect to any work related to clearance of cargo or ....
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.... the status of the person carrying the documents and whether he was authorized by the exporters or not and had also not physically verified the premises of the exporter. Therefore, he held that the appellant had violated Regulation 10(n). 11. We find that Regulation 10(n) does not require the customs broker to physically verify the functioning of the exporter at its address. This verification can be done through independent, authentic documents, data or information. If the IEC issued by the DGFT and the GSTIN issued by the Central or State GST authorities indicate that the exporter was operating from a particular address, the customs broker cannot be faulted for trusting the documents issued by these authorities. If the exporter did not ex....