Law:

Section:

(a) Notification--- ----Where the statute itself provides the date from which a notification is to become effective no general principle can be resorted to---Equities of the situation must always be looked into before giving retrospective effect to a notification. (b) Customs Act (IV of 1969)--------- ------S. 25-B [as it stood in 1991-1992]---Constitution of Pakistan (1973), Art. 199---Constitutional petition---Goods of the petitioner were allowed to be cleared upon payment of duty at the rate of US $800 as per declaration of the petitioner and furnishing bank guarantee for the disputed amount---Provision of S.25-13, Customs Act, 1969 enabled the Central Board of Revenue or its delegatee to fix the ITP of goods at such rates as it might deem fit but there was no room for unfettered discretion in public law and all public powers must be exercised rationally and upon objective considerations---No material, in the present case, was placed on record to indicate as to what persuaded the Controller of Customs Valuation to fix the ITP of the imported goods at US $1165 per metric ton, it had also not been explained whether the ITP had rightly been fixed on 29-10-1991 and as to what persuaded the competent Authority to slash it by more than 30% within six months---Record showed that equally responsible officer of the Customs viz. the Collector of Customs as well as the Valuation Inspectors under Statutory Rules . (COTECNA), who were required to be aware of the trend of international prices had opined well before clearance of the consignments that the value declared (US $800) by the importer was not incorrect---Department had allowed to clear the consignment upon furnishing bank guarantee subject to resolution of the question of the correct ITP and as such it was a live issue rather than a past and closed transaction on 1-4-1992---High Court, in circumstances, round no justification in refusing to give retrospective effect to the notification dated 1-4-1992 insofar as same concerned the petitioner---Constitutional petition was allowed to the extent of holding the petitioner's liability to pay customs duty at the rate of US $830 per metric ton who will deposit the…

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