9911796707
TMI Blog1985 (12) TMI 190X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... 1. For the sake of convenience we propose to refer to the parties before us by their original description in the petition. The appellants were respondents 21 to 3 in the Writ Petition and respondent No. 2 was respondent No. 4 in the Writ Petition. 2. The relevant facts necessary for the appreciation of the controversy raised in the appeal are fairly brief. The petitioners are a Public Limited Company manufacturing, inter alia absorbent cotton wool which was an export commodity. In or about 1969 the Union of India formulated a Scheme of cash subsidy whereby, inter alia, exporters of absorbent cotton wool were to be granted a cash subsidy by way of cash compensatory support equivalent to 15% of the F.O.B. value. The petitioners manufactu ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... t No. 4, namely, the Basic Chemicals, Pharmaceuticals and Soap export policy. Handbooks of Export Policy were published by the said Export Promotions Council. A perusal of Item No. 88.1 of Annexure II of the said Handbook and the relevant provisions shows that the policy of the Government was to grant cash subsidy against the export of product listed therein and the product listed therein was described as the absorbent cotton wool . The subsidy granted was to the extent of 15% of the F.O.B. value of the said product. The aforesaid facts appear from the Handbooks published by the said Council for the years 1970, 1973, 1975 and so on. As already observed, the product described in the Handbook, on which cash subsidy of 15% on F.O.B. value was ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... exure II and was entitled to cash allowance on that footing. This decision was confirmed by the Headquarter Classification Committee on 2nd December, 1974. That Committee is working under the Government of India in its Ministry of Commerce and the minutes of the relevant meetings show that the meeting was attended by several Government officials, including the Chief Controller of Imports and Exports and Officers from the Ministry of Finance. This decision of the Classification Committee was accepted by the Government and the petitioners applications for cash subsidy which had been kept pending were granted. The petitioners continued to receive the cash subsidy on the export of the aforesaid product till March, 1977 and it was only in Septe ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... at it contains a detailed description of the product manufactured by the petitioners and states that Both samples are also satisfactory in respect of composition, bleaching, resistance to pulling, colouring matter, acidity, alkalinity, surface-active substances, colour of aquecuos extract, free from seas, land, small foreign matter and fluorescence when viewed under ultraviolet radiation..... and contains an opinion that according to the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, the samples comply in all respects with the requirements of the British Pharmacopoeial Standards Codex No. 1975, which would imply that they were regarded as absorbent cotton of pharmaceutical quality. In the grounds the petitioners have specifically averred that in Int ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ll carded cotton fibres and other microscopic characteristics. It appears that on this basis that the respondents have taken the stand that the petitioners are not entitled to the cash subsidy claimed by the petitioners, as the product manufactured by the petitioners was uncarded and not absorbent cotton of the carded variety. 3. Now, it is well settled that in cases like this what is of primary importance is not how a product is described in Pharmacopoeias or in scientific works, but how it is regarded in common parlance pertaining to the relevant trade. In the present case, therefore, what would be material is as to whether this absorbent cotton of the uncarded variety manufactured by the petitioners and exported by them is regarded as ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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