H.R. Syiem, Member (T)

1. There are two orders in these two appeals : one is order-in-original No. 10/85, dated 30-9-1985 passed by the Collector of Central Excise, Guntur and the other, order-in-original No. 7/85, dated 27-7-1985 passed by the Additional Collector of Central Excise, Guntur.

2. The dispute is the same in both the cases. The appellants, M/s. Standard Industrial Engineering made what the Central Excise say were goods viz. purlins, trusses, rafters bracings etc. from MS plates, channels, angles, rounds, supplied to them by another person. The department say that the trusses, purlins, bracings were all goods assessable under Item 68, because they were fabricated from the angles, MS plates, channels etc. and that in the fabrication, the finished goods have come to acquire new names, characters and uses and that the processing constituted a manufacture within the meaning of Section 2(f) of the Central Excises and Salt Act.

3. At the hearing, the learned counsel for M/s. Standard Industrial argued that the Tribunal had already decided this dispute in MANU/CE/0100/1986 : 1986 (25) ELT 580 re: Aruna Industries; and the Collector has accepted that decision of this Tribunal.

4. They made sheds and set them up on behalf of another party from materials and steel sections supplied to them. In terms of the Aruna decision of this Tribunal, they are not liable to pay any duty, because there was no manufacture; and I agree with him.

5. The learned counsel for the department, however, said that the facts in these cases were different from Aruna, but I am not able to agree with him. The facts may differ in one or two particulars, but in substance and in principle and most details the cases are alike and the decision in Aruna must apply here.

6. The appellants manufactured the purlins, trusses etc. from materials they received from a party called VSP. The materials were steel channels, steel angles, MS plates and other steel products. From these they made purlins, trusses, rafters, bracings etc. for the shed or structure they put up on behalf of VSP. The materials were drilled, cut, sized, and according to the Additional Collector, removed in CKD condition; the Collector says that they were removed in semi-finished condition to the site. It is clear from this that the angles, channels, sheets were only sized and drilled at one place, but were actually put up and fitted in the structure only at the site. It is not that they removed trusses, purlins, braces, but channels, angles and sheets which had been suitably sized according to the measurements required for the planned structure. The Collector and the Additional Collector both say that these were made to intricate and complicated drawings, which may well be. There would certainly be drawings, specifications etc., because you cannot simply take an angle or a channel and a sheet made in the steel factory and start applying your band-saw cutting machine to them, and fix them hugger mugger every which way, because that is the most eminent way adapted to producing a cut channel or a sheet that fits nowhere. If a shed or structure of a given size is to be set up and you need purlins, trusses for the roof, you will jolly well have to measure before cutting or drilling or whatever you do, if you want the cut, channels and beams to fit where they are meant to be fitted. If the Additional Collector and the Collector find all this intricate or complicated, I would not contradict them; but there are few who will find them so. They speak of the Intricate building structural; we have found nothing more intricate than measuring, cutting and drilling - nothing very intricate or difficult about this. And a structure of this kind is the simplest one you can have because it hardly needs any architectural design: it is a strictly utility structure for doing...in, and is not for human occupation. That it needs to be strong is only to be expected, and that is why steel sections are used, but that it i