An exporter is entitled to amend shipping bills under Section 149 of the Customs Act, 1962, to rectify a bona fide clerical error in the scheme code, provided the substantive entitlement is established by documentary evidence existing at the time of export, regardless of administrative procedural circulars.

This appeal has been filed by M/s Sigma Exports, New Delhi (herein after, referred to as “the appellants”, for short) assailing the Order-in Original No. 75/2024-25/Commissioner/CEAC/NS-II/CAC/JNCH dated 24.06.2024 (herein after, referred to as “the impugned order”) passed by the Commissioner of Customs (NS-II), Jawaharlal Nehru Custom House (JNCH), Nhava Sheva.

2.1 Brief facts of the case, leading to this appeal, are summarized herein below:

2.2. The appellants herein is an exporter of ‘made-up articles of textiles’ viz., 100% Organic Cotton Handloom/Power loom Cushion Covers, Organic Cotton power loom K. Towels, falling under Chapter 63 of the Customs Tariff Act, 1975 and for export of such goods they have filed 147 Shipping Bills (S/Bs) before the jurisdictional customs authorities.

2.3 In terms of the export promotion measures introduced by the Central Government, Ministry of Textiles, export of apparels and made-up sector of textiles, were provided with rebate of State taxes and Central taxes in order to avoid the taxes being built in with the cost of export of goods under the scheme of Rebate of State Levies (RoSL). However, as certain taxes continued to be present in the cost of exports, the Ministry of Textiles in the Central Government had discontinued RoSL scheme and a new scheme viz., Rebate of State and Central Taxes and Levies (RoSCTL) was introduced vide Notification No. 14/26/2016-IT (Vol.II) dated 07.03.2019. Under such scheme, the Central Government in accordance with the recognised international economic principle of Zero rating of export products, provided for rebate of State and Central Taxes and Levies in addition to the ‘’Duty Drawback Scheme’ on export of garments and made ups i.e., all goods falling under Chapter 61 or 62, all goods falling under Chapter 63 of the Schedule of All Industry Rates (AIR) of Drawback Schedule excluding certain goods specified therein. The rates of drawback under the said scheme was recommended by the Drawback Committee constituted by the Government. For claiming rebate under the above scheme, an exporter was required to make such claim for rebate on the exportation of each of the goods, by declaring it in the S/B at the item level. RoSCTL scheme was implemented through issue of scrip by the Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) through a Merchandise Exports from India Scheme (MEIS) type scrip system. It was also envisaged that such scheme will be administered on the basis of electronic online interface wherein ‘electronic duty credit ledger’ will be created by the customs authorities in Customs EDI system and DGFT authorities, on the basis of system-based approval of the final entitlement, shall issue the scrips online, obviating the need for unnecessary human interface and for promoting efficiency in the process of obtaining export promotion benefits to legitimate exporters. Corresponding instructions in the procedure to be followed for implementation of RoSCTL scheme for extending the benefit to the exporters was issued by the Drawback Division of the Ministry of Finance vide Circular No.10/2019-Customs dated 12.03.2019.

2.4 Since the appellants were claiming the duty drawback benefit with MEIS benefits in respect of the export of goods prior to introduction of the aforesaid schemes, for exports made during the period 08.03.2019 to 07.05.2020, they had inadvertently continued to file the S/Bs indicating exports under the scheme code “19” applicable for ‘drawback scheme’, instead of indicating the correct code “60” relevant to RoSCTL scheme. Upon submission of the details of exports to the DGFT authorities on 15.01.2022 for claiming the RoSCTL benefits, and in response e-mail dated 02.02.2022 received from DGFT stating that the scheme code mentioned in the relevant S/Bs/Let