Customs Act, 1962 › Chapter XIV — Confiscation of goods and conveyances and imposition of penalties

Section 114A. Penalty for short-levy or non-levy of duty in certain cases

Customs Act, 1962

Bare Act

Penalty for short-levy or non-levy of duty in certain cases. — Where the duty has not been levied or has been short-levied or the interest has not been charged or paid or has [Omitted]been part paid or the duty or interest has been erroneously refunded by reason of collusion or any wilful mis-statement or suppression of facts, the person who is liable to pay the duty or interest, as the case may be, as determined under sub-section (8) of section 28 shall also be liable to pay a penalty equal to the duty or interest so determined:

Provided that where such duty or interest, as the case may be, as determined under sub-section (8) of section 28, and the interest payable thereon under section 5 28AA, is paid within thirty days from the date of the communication of the order of the proper officer determining such duty, the amount of penalty liable to be paid by such person under this section shall be twenty-five per cent of the duty or interest, as the case may be, so determined:

Provided further that the benefit of reduced penalty under the first proviso shall be available subject to the condition that the amount of penalty so determined has also been paid within the period of thirty days referred to in that proviso:

Provided also that where the duty or interest determined to be payable is reduced or increased by the Commissioner (Appeals), the Appellate Tribunal or, as the case may be, the court, then, for the purposes of this section, the duty or interest as reduced or increased, as the case may be, shall be taken into account:

Provided also that in case where the duty or interest determined to be payable is increased by the Commissioner (Appeals), the Appellate Tribunal or, as the case may be, the court, then, the benefit of reduced penalty under the first proviso shall be available if the amount of the duty or the interest so increased, along with the interest payable thereon under section 5 28AA, and twenty-five percent of the consequential increase in penalty have also been paid within thirty days of the communication of the order by which such increase in the duty or interest takes effect:

Provided also that where any penalty has been levied under this section, no penalty shall be levied under section 112 or section 114.

Explanation. — For the removal of doubts, it is hereby declared that -

(i) the provisions of this section shall also apply to cases in which the order determining the duty or interest sub-section (8) of section 28 relates to notices issued prior to the date* on which the Finance Act, 2000 receives the assent of the President;

(ii) any amount paid to the credit of the Central Government prior to the date of communication of the order referred to in the first proviso or the fourth proviso shall be adjusted against the total amount due from such person.

Judgments on Section 114A

Imperial Fibres Pvt Ltd vs Mundra — CESTAT, 31 Aug 2026. The extended period under Section 28(4) of the Customs Act cannot be invoked, and a beneficial exemption cannot be denied, where the department's delayed, partial and unauthenticated foreign verification of Certificates…
Shri Gagan Vohra vs Commissioner Central Excise, Customs,… — CESTAT, 24 Aug 2026. A declared transaction value may be rejected under Rule 12 of the Customs Valuation Rules, 2007 and re-determined sequentially under Rules 4–9, because voluntary Section 108 statements to Customs officers (who are not…
Vrunda International vs Customs Ahmedabad — CESTAT, 17 Aug 2026. Preferential/FTA duty benefit cannot be denied, nor duty, confiscation or penalty confirmed, on suspicion or third-party verification alone — the department must verify the importer's own Certificate of Origin from the…
Balaji Niryat Pvt Ltd vs Kolkata-Port — CESTAT, 22 Jul 2026. Preferential tariff treatment under a trade agreement cannot be denied merely because the overseas supplier failed to cooperate in an origin verification, where the Certificates of Origin covering the importer's own…
M/S. A.P.P. Enterprises vs The Commissioner Of Customs — Madras High Court, 29 Apr 2026. Consistent miscoding of export scheme codes and use of parallel invoices across numerous consignments amounts to wilful suppression within Section 28(4) — not a bonafide clerical mistake — and a DRI clean chit cannot…
Mahesh Agarwal Partner vs Cc Sea Ch - Ii — CESTAT, 13 Mar 2026. Where higher-value parallel documents are recovered from the importer's own possession and corroborated by voluntary Section 108 admissions and extra-commercial payments, declared transaction value may be rejected, the…
M/S Xiaomi Technology India Private… vs Commissioner Of Customs Air… — CESTAT, 14 Nov 2025. Royalty and licence fee paid by an importer under agreements with IPR holders, not disclosed to the customs authorities, is includible in the assessable value under Rule 10(1)(c) of the Customs Valuation Rules, 2007,…
Van Oord India Pvt Ltd vs Customs Ahmedabad — CESTAT, 13 Nov 2025. Physical non-availability of goods is no bar to confiscation under Section 111 or redemption fine under Section 125, but the fine must be commensurate with the duty benefit actually accrued, and a Section 114AA penalty…
P C Jain vs Kolkata-Port — CESTAT, 15 May 2025. A charge of undervaluation cannot be sustained on diary entries and statements alone without independent evidence such as NIDB data, market enquiry or contemporaneous higher values, and an adjudication in which…
Hemant Bohra vs Commissioner Of Customs-Nhava Sheva -… — CESTAT, 26 Aug 2024. Drawback provisions being an incentive-oriented scheme for augmenting exports, procedural requirements such as Rule 13(1)(a) documentation and Section 149 shipping bill amendment must receive a liberal construction and…
T N Malhotra vs Principal Commissioner, Customs-New… — CESTAT, 4 Jun 2024. The transaction value of past imports can be enhanced only on the basis of invoices or other documents pertaining to those very imports; loading the values of live consignments onto past bills of entry in the absence of…
Commr.Of Customs (Import) Mumbai vs M/S Ganpati Overseas Thr. Its… — Supreme Court of India, 6 Oct 2023. Undervaluation must be proved by the department through evidence or information of contemporaneous imports of like goods at higher prices, and mere suspicion of the invoice or reliance on foreign export…
M/S.N.C.Alexender vs The Commissioner Of Customs — Madras High Court, 9 Jun 2022. Show cause notices and adjudication orders issued by DRI officers are valid because they are appointed as 'Officers of Customs' under Section 4 of the Customs Act, 1962, and Section 97 of the Finance Act, 2022…
I.G. International vs Cc (Import) Nhavasheva — CESTAT, 25 Oct 2019. Payment of differential duty before issuance of the show cause notice does not bar imposition of penalty where undervaluation by suppression/fraud is established, but confiscation and redemption fine cannot be sustained…
Quest Retail Private Limited vs Patparganj — CESTAT, 16 Jul 2019. Royalty and franchise fees paid for post-importation services such as management, consultation and training, measured by domestic sales volumes, are not includible in the assessable value under Rule 10(1)(c) of the…
Swati Menthol & Allied Chemicals Ltd & vs Joint Director - Directorate Of Revenue… — Gujarat High Court, 8 Jan 2014. A DRI officer to whom a notification (such as that dated 6.7.2011) specifically assigns functions under sections 17 and 28 for the purposes of section 2(34) is a 'proper officer' competent to issue a show cause notice…
Union Of India (Uoi) Through The… vs Hoganas India Ltd. And Ors. [Alongwith… — Bombay High Court, 21 Jul 2005. The Settlement Commission under Chapter XIV-A has a very wide jurisdiction to entertain all kinds of settlement applications under Section 127B — including cases involving fraud or mis-declaration — provided the…
M/S Associated Cement Companies Ltd vs Commissioner Of Customs — Supreme Court of India, 25 Jan 2001. Goods which the Customs Tariff Act itself makes free of import duty (such as drawings and designs under heading 49.06) are 'goods' under Section 2(22) but not 'dutiable goods' under Section 2(14), since duty is neither…
Veeresh Prasad General Manager… vs Commissioner Of Customs - Chennai Ii… — CESTAT, 8 Sep 2026. Interest on a levy under the Customs Tariff Act (such as the IGST under Section 3) can be demanded only if the legislature has specifically provided for it, so the substituted Section 3(12) of the Customs Tariff Act,…
Hazel Mercantile Limited vs Kandla Customs — CESTAT, 7 Sep 2026. Where the department's test reports are inconclusive or bested by more specialized reports under the 'most akin' test, and the disputed goods are merely a species of the declared genus (NGL within Naphtha) covered by…

All 56 judgments