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862 EXCISE LAW TIMES [ Vol. 372

to authorities under Customs Act, 1962. It was thus concluded that this submis-
sion of Revenue fell within the Kelsen categorization as ‘jurisprudential interpre-
tation’ which, without nexus, would not succeed as an acceptable proposition.
Indeed, as pointed out in the decision, the adjudicating authority did not essay in
that direction at all.
30. Therefore, the decision in re Knowledge Infrastructure Systems Private
Limited, with its emphasis on the ineffaceable nexus with collection of duty and
enforcement of prohibition, places a limiting framework on the invoking of the
detriment contained therein only to such aspects of any show cause notice to the
exclusion of all others. There is no perpetual jurisdiction to re-visit an assessment
except for the twin objectives, enshrined in Customs Act, 1962, for levy of duty
and enforcement of any prohibition. It is for the State to acknowledge the threats
to its existence for establishing the means to survive these. The State does not,
without express intention in a statute, expect its various organs to delude them-
selves into believing that only one law and one agency is necessary, or can, guard
the interests of the State.
31. Unlike in that dispute, the investigating agency resorted to the Cus-
toms Valuation (Determination of Value of Imported Goods) Rules, 2007 to justi-
fy the rejection of declared value and to infer a substitute value merely to justify
the invoking of the provisions for confiscation. Indeed, at this stage, we would be
serving the larger cause of the law by examining the scope for determining the
nature, or the existence, of offence when goods are subject to revaluation. Before
the insertion of Rule 10A in the erstwhile Customs Valuation (Determination of
Valuation of Imported Goods) Rules, 1988 (Rule 12 of the present Rules), the ju-
dicial decision governing rejection of transaction value was that of the Hon’ble
Supreme Court in Mirah Exports Pvt. Ltd. v. Collector of Customs [Civil Appeal No.
1030-34/90, decided on 4 February, 1998] [1998 (98) E.L.T. 3 (S.C.)] requiring any
revaluation to be a consequence of discharge of onus by customs authorities to
establish that the declared value did not reflect the transaction. In such circum-
stances of having evidenced flow of funds other than that declared in the bill of
entry, the invoking of confiscation under Section 111(m) of Customs Act, 1962
may have been justified. With the mechanism of valuation having been transfig-
ured, by placing the importer on notice of non-acceptability of the declared price
before proceeding to revalue the goods, in the absence of acceptable defence, the
question of confiscation under Section 111(m) of Customs Act, 1962 brings up the
spectacle of administrative overreach. Value is susceptible to many interpreta-
tions and definitions. For the purpose of levy of duties of customs, certain rules
of engagement, universally acknowledged, are enacted in the statute and the
governing Rules. Mere application of the Rules for enhancement of value does
not carry with it the stigma of misdeclaration. To do so would be to place a pre-
mium on, and accord a finality to, the value arrived at for the limited objective of
levy without in any way impinging upon the contractual obligation between
buyer and seller operating in a commercial marketplace. Therefore, it will be es-
sential for an adjudicating authority to establish that the difference between the
assessed value and the declared value arises from circumstances in which there
has been an attempt to conceal the real transaction in money. In the absence of
such evidence, goods that are burdened with revaluation, conceived from com-
parison with other imports, should not be further burdened by confiscation
which was intended as a definitive consequence of the committing of an offence.
We dare to say that it is in these circumstances, revaluation of imported goods, as
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