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2008 PTD 905

FASTLINE (PVT.) LTD. vs COLLECTOR CUSTOMS and others

Citation2008 PTD 905
CourtLahore High Court
Case No.Writ Petition No,909 of 2008
Date2008-02-06
Judge(s)Khawaja Farooq Saeed
ResultOrder accordingly

ORDER

' KH. FAROOQ SAEED, J.---At this pre-admission stage, learned counsel for the petitioner as well as learned legal advisors entered appearance and advanced the arguments in favour and against the admission respectively.

2. The petitioner's point of view remained that since the assessment is without confrontation besides no appeal lies against the provisional order under section 81, the writ petition should be admitted. Learned counsel for the respondents have argued that in the presence of section 25-D, this Court cannot entertain a writ petition like this.

3. So far as the arguments that any enactment can deprive a person of his right of invoking writ jurisdiction is concerned, it appears to be a misconception. The constitutional jurisdiction by the High Court in terms of Article 199 cannot be withdrawn by making an amendment in the Customs Act.

4. Learned counsel for the petitioner inter alia has argued that no notice before provisional assessm ent under section 81 was given to the petitioner. Besides the item of the assessee is "Raw Blanks" which by no means can come within the definition of pencil. He added that the raw blanks after its import go through a large number of process which if counted are almost 15 plus. It is after almost 15 phases that the pencil becomes consumable. Regarding maintainability, he referred following cases in his favour "Collector of Customs (Valuation) and another v. Karachi Bulk Storage and Terminal Ltd. 2007 SCM R 1357 and Collector of Customs Port Muhammad Bin Qasim v. Messrs Zymotic Diagnostic International, Faisalabad 2007 PTD 2623.

5. The respondent's case on the other hand remains that so-called process done by the petitioner are only to the extent of putting colour on the pencil and printing of its brand name etc. The product even before colouring and printing or adding rubber tips can be used. The process is value addition process and even without the same, the so-called raw blanks can be used as a full-fledge writing article. The respondents, therefore, urged for rejection of this petition.

6. Since a small question of law and facts is involved in this case, we would like to dispose of the same for which the case is formally admitted.

7. So far as the factual controversy is concerned, the same is ignored for the time being so as to leave room for the departmental officer to look into the matter again. However, since no notice has not been served on the petitioner before assessment, the Assistant Collector Customs is directed to reassess the same within two weeks of the service of this order, and also for the reasons that apparently the sequential order provided in section 25 has not been adopted as per instructions in the judgment reported as 2007 PTD 2623 by the Supreme Court of Pakistan in the case re; Collector of Customs Port Muhammad Bin Qasim v. Messrs Zymotic Diagnostic International, Faisalabad". The Assessing Officer is directed to re-assess the same within two weeks of the service of this order. He shall obviously confront the base of his estimate to the petitioner before deciding the customs duty chargeable on the product.

8. Disposed of accordingly.

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