IN THE HIGH COURT OF ORISSA AT CUTTACK OTAPL No.105 of 2025 Commissioner of Customs …. Appellant (Preventive), Bhubaneswar Mr. Sujan Kumar Roy Choudhury, Senior Standing Counsel -versus-

Shri Ajay Gupta …. Respondent Mr. Saswat Kumar Acharya, Advocate assisted by Mr. Abhisek Agarwal, Advocate and Mr. Abhijeet Agarwal, Advocate CORAM:

THE HON’BLE THE CHIEF JUSTICE AND THE HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE MURAHARI SRI RAMAN

ORDER

Order No. 18.12.2025

01. 1. Assailing order No.50285-20288/2025 dated 7^th February, 2025 passed by the Customs, Excise and Service Tax Appellate Tribunal, New Delhi (for short, “the CESTAT”) in Customs Appeal No.54711 of 2023, arising out of Order-in- Original No.06/Manish Saxena/Commr./Adj)/Delhi/NCH/2022- 23, dated 30.11.2022; directed against the order of the Commissioner of Customs (Preventive), Commissionerate, Bhubaneswar, the instant appeal has been filed raising the following question(s) of law:

“i) Whether on the facts and circumstance of the case, the Ld. Tribunal is correct in law and facts in allowing the appeal filed by Respondent against the Order-in-Original No.06/Manish Saxena/Commr(Adj.)/Delhi/NCH/2022-23 dated

30.11.2022 passed by the Commissioner, Customs (Adjudication), Delhi Zone, New Delhi?

ii) Whether on the facts and circumstances of the case the Ld. Tribunal is correct in holding that the net Fe content of Iron Ore Fines for the purpose of levy of Customs duty shall be determined on WMT basis applying the conversion formula, when the emergence of formula for such conversion has no statutory basis?

iii) Whether on the facts and circumstance of the case, the Ld. Tribunal is correct in law and facts in setting aside the Order-in-Original dated 30.11.2022 passed by the Commissioner, Customs (Adjudication), Delhi Zone, New Delhi, when data was retrieved, from the mobile phones, by the forensic database of Mr. Ajay Gupta who is the employee of Mr. Manish Khemka, Director of M/s. Disha Realcon Pvt. Ltd., it was found that there is incidence of duty liability when cargo was split into two parts, i.e., less than 58% and above 58% though the average FE Content of the combined Cargo is more than 58%”

2. The learned CESTAT, upon taking into consideration of factual merit of the matter, has held as follows:

“31. To sum up:

a) Each Shipping Bill or Bill of Entry has to be assessed and the Customs Act does not provide for assessing two or more Shipping Bills together;

b) Consequently, the classification, valuation or determination of any other parameter relevant to assessment also has to be for each Shipping Bill or Bill of Entry;

c) No officer of Customs including the DRI officers and the Commissioner of Customs has any power under the law to assess two or more Shipping Bills together or determine the Fe content or any other parameter combining goods covered by two or more Shipping Bills, even if they are loaded in the same vessel;

d) The Bill of Lading is the document of title issued by the Master of the vessel or the shipping line to the exporter and the fact that a single Bill of Lading is issued in respect of two or more Shipping Bills does not confer any right on any officer of customs to assess two or more Shipping Bills together or to demand consequential differential duty, and e) Fe content of iron ore fines for export has to be determined on wet basis as per the judgment of Supreme Court in Gangadhar Narsinghdas and the CBEC’s Circular that followed and the Commissioner erred in reckoning the Fe content on dry basis

32. The impugned order dated 30.11.2022 passed by the Commissioner cannot, therefore, be sustained and needs to be set aside. The impugned order is, accordingly, set aside and all the four appeals are allowed with consequential relief(s) to the appellants.”

3. Learned Advocate appearing for the respondent submitted that the questions of law as posed by the appellant on the facts and in the circumstances of the case are no more res integra by virtue of judgment dated 31.07.2025 of this Court passed