Paritosh Kumar Mukherjee, J. - (1.) The instant writ petition was moved challenging, inter alia, the order of revision passed by the Central Government whereby the revisional authority declined to interfere with the appellate order dated May 21, 1976 which affirmed the original order of imposing penalty dated November 11, 1970 of Rs. 10, 000/- upon the writ petitioner under Rule 126L(16) of Part XIIA of the Defence of India Rules, 1962.
(2.) At the time of admission of the writ petition this court was pleased to issue a rule and granted interim order in terms of prayer (f) of the petition and thereby restrained the respondents from giving any effect to the order dated November 11,1970 passed by the Collector of Central Excise and Customs, pending the disposal of the writ petition.
(3.) The case of the petitioner, in short, is as follows: On or about April 8/9, 1968 a group of Customs Officers of the Divisional Preventive Unit, Krishnagar armed themselves with three search authorisations, all issued under Sec. 105 of the Customs Act and searched the residence of the petitioner as well as his gold dealing establishment known as "Akshoy Guinea House" and recovered therefrom and subsequently seized several pieces of gold bars, gold ornaments, obsolete Indian coins, Pak currency notes and Indian currency notes. All the aforesaid Articles, including the currency notes were detained by the aforesaid officers under the provisions of the Customs Act, 1962.;