G. Sankaran, Member (T)

1. The captioned appeal was originally filed as a revision application before the Central Government which, under Section 131-B of the Customs Act, 1962, has come as transferred proceedings to this Tribunal for disposal as if it were an appeal filed before it.

2. The facts of the case, briefly stated, are that the appellants imported from Malaysia a consignment of coconut oil. The goods were described as "white coconut oil, unrefined" in the bill of entry filed for their clearance. They were allowed to be cleared for home consumption, without payment of additional duty of customs, on execution of a bond bending chemical test. On 23-9-1978, the Assistant Collector of Customs, Madras wrote to the appellants informing them that the goods were found on test to be refined coconut oil and hence liable to additional duty of customs of Rs. 15,000/-. The appellants contested the demand which, however, was confirmed by the Assistant Collector by his order dated 28-4-1979. The appeal against this order was dismissed by the Appellate Collector by his order of 1-7-1981. It is against this order that the appellants are now before us.

3. Before we set out the rival contentions, we may take note of one or two things. There is no dispute about the position that coconut oil falls under Item 12, of the First Schedule to the Central Excises and Salt Act, 1944 (CET, for short) reading : "Vegetable Non-Essential Oils, all sorts", (V.N.E. Oils, for short). In actual practice, however, not all such oils are charged to duty. Notification No. 33/63, dated 1-3-1963 exempts all sorts of V.N.E. oils other than processed V.N.E. oils. It also exempts processed V.N.E. oils if used in the manufacture of specified goods subject to certain conditions. The notification defines "processed V.N.E. oils" for this purpose in the following terms :

"Explanation.-For the purpose of this notification "processed vegetable non-essential oil" means a vegetable non-essential oil which has undergone, subsequent to its extraction, any one or more of the following processes, namely :-

(i) Treatment with alkali or acid;

(ii) Bleaching ;

(iii) Deodorization.

4. It is the appellants' contention that the imported oil is not "processed oil" for the purpose of the notification. The department holds to the contrary.

5. Shri K.R. Mehta, Consultant for the appellants, submitted with reference to the order placed on the suppliers, the supplier's invoice, the bill of lading, the Port Health Officer's certificate on test of a sample of the imported oil, and the suppliers' certificate that the imported oil was not refined. As against all these the only evidence produced by the department is the chemical Examiner's report which gave the acid value as less than 0.5 (which is often fund in raw unrefined coconut oil too) and, for the rest, was an expression of opinion that the oil could be considered as processed. Shri Mehta cited the Gujarat High Court decision in Steadfast Paper Mills v. Collector of Central Excise, Baroda and Ors. [1983 E.L.T. 744 (Guj.)] to the effect that it was not in the Chemical Examiner's province to give opinion on tariff classification. On the merits of the classification, he relied on the Tribunal's decision in Collector of Customs, Bombay v. Godrej Soap Ltd., Bombay and Ors. MANU/CE/0107/1985 : [1985 (21) E.L.T. 805] involving a similar issue and also Government of India's order in revision In re : Bombay Oil Industries Pvt. Ltd. and Ors. (1982 E.L.T. 707). He also submitted that Indian Standards Specifications on raw and refined coconut oil were not relevant for the present purpose since they were only quality control standards and not decisive of tariff classifications. In this connection, he relied on the Supreme Court decision in Indian Aluminium Cables Ltd. v. Union of India and Ors. MANU/SC/0187/1985 : [1985 (21) E.L.T. 3].

6. Replying to these arguments, Shri A.S. Sundar Rajan, Departmental Representative, submitted that the ratio of the