Dr A K Singh, Additional Director, NACEN, Faridabad

assessment includes provisional assessment, reassessment and any order of assessment in which the duty assessed is nil; Commissioner of Customs, except for the purposes of Chapter XV, includes an Additional Commissioner of Customs; customs area means the area of a customs station and includes any area in which imported goods or export goods are ordinarily kept before clearance by Customs Authorities;

customs station means any customs port, customs airport or land customs station; entry in relation to goods means an entry made in a bill of entry, shipping bill or bill of export and includes in the case of goods imported or to be exported by post, the entry referred to in section 82 or the entry made under the regulations made under section 84;

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23) import, means bringing into India from a place outside India; (24) import manifest or import report means the manifest or report required to be delivered under section 30; (25) imported goods means any goods brought into India from a place outside India but does not include goods which have been cleared for home consumption; (26) importer, in relation to any goods at any time between their importation and the time when they are cleared for home consumption, includes any owner or any person holding himself out to be the importer;

(27) India includes the territorial waters of India; (28) Indian customs waters means the [waters extending into the sea up to the limit of contiguous zone of India under section 5 of the Territorial Waters, Continental Shelf, Exclusive Economic Zone and other Maritime Zones Act, 1976 (80 of 1976)] and includes any bay, gulf, harbour, creek or tidal river;

in relation to any goods, means any act or omission which will render such goods liable to confiscation under section 111 or section 113;

(43) warehouse means a public warehouse appointed under section 57 or a private warehouse licensed under section 58; (44) warehoused goods means goods deposited in a warehouse; (45) warehousing station means a place declared as a warehousing station under section 9.

1) Except as otherwise provided in this Act, or any other law for the time being in force, duties of customs shall be levied at such rates as may be specified under the Customs Tariff Act, 1975 (51 of 1975), or any other law for the time being in force, on goods imported into, or exported from, India. (2) The provisions of sub-section (1) shall apply in respect of all goods belonging to Government as they apply in respect of goods not belonging to Government.

If any imported goods are pilfered after the unloading thereof and before the proper officer has made an order for clearance for home consumption or deposit in a warehouse, the importer shall not be liable to pay the duty leviable on such goods except where such goods are restored to the importer after pilferage.

the value of the imported goods and export goods shall be the transaction value of such goods,

Only places notified by the Government shall be Customs ports or Customs airports for the unloading of imported goods and loading of export goods. At each such customs ports, the Commissioner of Customs is empowered to approve proper places for the unloading and loading of goods and he also specifies the limits of any Customs area. The person in charge of the vessel or an aircraft shall not call or land at any place other than the Customs port/airport, except in cases of emergencies.

Section 37 empowers the proper officer to board any conveyance carrying imported goods or export goods. The proper officer may question the person in charge of the vessel or aircraft. He may demand production of documents and also ask questions, to be answered by such person. The person in charge of the conveyance is bound to comply with these requirements [Section 38].

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The Master / Agent of the vessel or an aircraft has to deliver an import manifest (an import report in case of a vehicle), within 24 hours after arrival in the case of a vessel and 12 hours after arrival in the case of an aircraft or a vehicle in the prescribed form. The time limit for filing the manifest is extendable on showing sufficient cause. In the case of a vessel or an aircraft, a manifest may also be filed even before arrival of the vessel or aircraft (known as Prior Entry Manifest) such advance manifests are accepted on any day within 14 days before the expected arrival of the vessel.

The Master of the vessel is not to permit the unloading of any imported goods until an order has been given by the proper officer granting Entry Inwards of such vessel. Normally, Entry Inwards is granted only after the import manifest has been delivered. Unloading of certain items like accompanied baggage, mail bags, animals, perishables and hazardous goods are exempted from this stipulation.

If the vessel does not arrive within the stipulated time of 14 days or such extended time as may be granted by the Assistant Commissioner (Imports), the manifest accepted provisionally is cancelled and the fact circulated through public notices. All the Bills of Entry filed against the cancelled manifest, become void. The importers have to return those Bills of Entry to the Import Department and to claim refund of duty, if paid on any such Bills of Entry. If the same vessel enters the port after the cancellation of the original manifests, it will be treated as a fresh entry and a fresh manifest is insisted upon

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To provide customs clearance facility near the place of importer ICDs are also called Dry Port All Import and Export Formalities including the duty payments etc are done at ICDs ICDs are normally located outside port town Container Freight Stations (CFS) can be located anywhere and usually attached to Sea Port/Air Port or ICD. ICDs are the place from where containers are aggregated for onward movement to and from ports CFS is a place where containers are stuffed, unstuffed and aggregation/segregation of cargo takes place

SECTION 53. Transit of certain goods without payment of duty. - Subject to the provisions of section 11, any goods imported in a conveyance and mentioned in the import manifest or the import report, as the case may be, as for transit in the same conveyance to any place outside India or any customs station may be allowed to be so transited without payment of duty.
SECTION 11. Power to prohibit importation or exportation of goods

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Goods imported in any customs station can be transshipped without payment of duty under Section 54 Transshipment means transfer from one conveyance to another Goods must be specified in IGM/IR and a Bill of Transshipment should be filed before Customs Officer. A Declaration of Transshipment is submitted if goods are imported under international treaty or Bilateral Agreement A Bond has to be executed for this purpose and the goods should be sealed during transshipment. A certificate has to be submitted within one month that goods has been properly transshipped

Liability of duty on goods transited under section 53 or transshipped under section 54. Where any goods are allowed to be transited under section 53 or transshipped under subsection (3) of section 54 to any customs station, they shall, on their arrival at such station, be liable to duty and shall be entered in like manner as goods are entered on the first importation thereof and the provisions of this Act and any rules and regulations shall, so far as may be, apply in relation to such goods.]

In transit goods continue to be on the same vessel, while in transshipment, goods are transferred to another vessel