‘No time limit prescribed in law for amendment of shipping bill’

We made shipments in January 2018 to June 2018 under advance authorization and now came to know that inputs mentioned in the advance authorization can be imported duty free under Free Trade Agreements. We want to convert our above shipping bills from advance authorisation to drawback shipping bills, as per Para 4.49 (e) of Handbook of Procedures, Vol 1, where no time limit for conversion is mentioned. However, the relevant custom circular for conversion of shipping bill 36/2010-customs dated 23rd September 2010 says that request for conversion must be made within 90 days. Considering the fact that our shipping bills are of January to June 2018 and that more than 90 days have passed since exports, what should we do to get duty drawback?

In the case of Diamond Engg (Chennai) P. Ltd. [2013(288) ELT 0265 (Tri. Mad.), the Tribunal held that Section 149 of the Customs Act, 1962 does not prescribe any time-limit for amendment of the document. The only condition is that the document on the basis of which amendment is sought should be available at the time of export. Therefore, the amendment sought cannot be denied on the ground of limitation. There are other case laws on the same point such as VRA Cotton Mills Pvt. Ltd. [2014 (309) ELT 0100 (Tri. Ahmd.)] and Parle Products Pvt. Ltd. [2017 (358) ELT 341 (Tri. Mumbai)].

The exporters of readymade garments (RMG) are granted Rebate of State Levies (ROSL) namely Value Added Tax (VAT) on fuel used in power generation duty on electricity generation and charges on purchase of grid power, mandi tax an purchase of cotton, stamp duties on export documents, SGST on inputs used in production of cotton and embedded SGST on purchases from unregistered dealers. Please confirm that the above said levies are not subsumed in GST. If the answer is in affirmative, should RMG exporters continue to avail ROSL?

The Ministry of Textiles introduced the ROSL scheme through notifications 12020/03/2016-IT, dated 12-8-2016 and 31-8-2016, much before introduction of GST. The ROSL rates were notified through notification 12020/03/2016-IT dated 138-2016. In ROSL scheme, the rebate of State levies is understood to comprise State VAT/CST on inputs including packaging, fuel, duty on electricity generation and duties and charges on purchase of grid power, as accumulated through the stages of production from yarn to finished garments. The taxes like VAT/CST, purchase tax etc. have been subsumed under the GST but taxes on fuel etc. have not been subsumed under GST. So, the ROSL rates were reduced upon introduction of GST through notification 14/26/2016-IT dated 27- 62017 effective from 1-7-2017. The revised rates are 0.39% for ROSL and 0.23% for ROSL under Advance Authorization-All Industry Rates (AA-AIR) combination respectively.

IGST exemption on imports under advance authorisation and EPCG authorisation was available till 1st October 2018. Has it been extended?

Yes. Notification 66/2018Customs dated 26th September 2018 has extended the IGST exemption on imports under advance authorisation and EPCG authorisation till 31st March 2019.