- (1.) Heard learned counsel for the appellant and Sri Krishna Agarwal, learned counsel for the Department.
(2.) This is an assessee's appeal under Section 130 of Customs Act, 1962 filed against the order of the Customs and Central Excise Appellate Tribunal dated 18-9-2014.
(3.) Following questions of law have been sought to be answered by this Court :- "(I) Whether the learned Tribunal was correct in upholding penalty upon the appellant under Section 114(1) of the Customs Act, 1962 in the absence of 'mens rea' which is the necessary ingredient of Section 114(i) of the Act as held by the learned High Court of Gujarat in the case of Anchor Logistics v. Commissioner of Customs - 2013 (290) E.L.T. 334 (Guj.). (II) Whether the learned Tribunal was correct in upholding penalty upon the appellant under Section 114AA of the Customs Act, 1962 in the absence of 'mens rea' which is the necessary ingredient of Section 114AA of the Act? (III) Whether the learned Tribunal was correct in upholding penalty upon the appellant merely because he had acted as "Customs House Agent" when there is not even an allegation in the show cause notice that the appellant had connived with the exporter in misdeclaring the subject goods as "basmati rice" which were later found by the department as "non-basmati" rice? (IV) Whether the impugned order passed by the learned Tribunal is not perverse, being totally contrary to the provisions of Customs Act, 1962 as well as facts available on record?" ;