Customs Act, 1962 › Chapter XV — Appeals and Revision

Section 130. Appeal to High Court

Customs Act, 1962

Bare Act

Appeal to High Court. —

(1) An appeal shall lie to the High Court from every order passed in appeal by the Appellate Tribunal on or after the 1st day of July, 2003 (not being an order relating, among other things, to the determination of any question having a relation to the rate of duty of customs or to the value of goods for the purposes of assessment), if the High Court is satisfied that the case involves a substantial question of law.

(2) The Principal Commissioner of Customs or Commissioner of Customs or the other party aggrieved by any order passed bythe Appellate Tribunal may file an appeal to the High Court and such appeal under this sub-section shall be -

(a) filed within one hundred and eighty days from the date on which the order appealed against is received by the Principal Commissioner of Customs or Commissioner of Customs or the other party;

(b) accompanied by a fee of two hundred rupees where such appeal is filed by the other party;

(2A) The High Court may admit an appeal after the expiry of the period of one hundred and eighty days referred to in clause(a) of sub-section (2), if it is satisfied that there was sufficient cause for not filing the same within that period.

(3) Where the High Court is satisfied that a substantial question of law is involved in any case, it shall formulate that question.

(4) The appeal shall be heard only on the question so formulated,and the respondents shall, at the hearing of the appeal, be allowed to argue that the case does not involve such question:

Provided that nothing in this sub-section shall be deemed to take away or abridge the power of the Court to hear, for reasons to be recorded, the appeal on any other substantial question of law not formulated by it, if it is satisfied that the case involves such question.

(5) The High Court shall decide the question of law so formulated and deliver such judgment thereon containing the grounds on which such decision is founded and may award such cost as it deems fit.

(6) The High Court may determine any issue which -

(a) has not been determined by the Appellate Tribunal; or

(b) has been wrongly determined by the Appellate Tribunal, by reason of a decision on such question of law as is referred to in sub-section (1).

(7) When an appeal has been filed before the High Court, it shall be heard by a bench of not less than two Judges of the High Court, and shall be decided in accordance with the opinion of such Judges or of the majority, if any, of such Judges.

(8) Where there is no such majority, the Judges shall state the point of law upon which they differ and the case shall, then, be heard upon that point only by one or more of the other Judges of the High Court and such point shall be decided according to the opinion of the majority of the Judges who have heard the case including those who first heard it.

(9) Save as otherwise provided in this Act, the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 (5 of 1908) relating to appeals to the High Court shall,as far as may be, apply in the case of appeals under this section.

Judgments on Section 130

Principal Commissioner Of Customs… vs M/S Radha Engineering Company — Calcutta High Court, 7 Oct 2026. A Tribunal order on the rate of duty or the value of goods for assessment cannot be appealed to the High Court under Section 130; the appeal lies directly to the Supreme Court under Section 130E of the Customs Act.
Commissioner Of Customs (Preventive) Lko. vs Anand Navalchand Pugaliya — Allahabad High Court, 2 Sep 2026. Reasonable belief backed by substantive evidence of foreign origin is a sine qua non for seizure and for shifting the burden of proof under Section 123; mere suspicion is insufficient, and the customs authorities must…
M/S Vogue Logistics Pvt Ltd vs The Commissioner Of Customs Airport And General — Delhi High Court, 31 Aug 2026. Where oral evidence is sought to be relied upon in an inquiry under Regulation 17 of the CBLR, the Customs Broker must be afforded the corresponding right of cross-examination under Regulation 17(4), but a procedural…
M/S Alupro Building Systems Pvt. Ltd vs Commissioner Of Central Excise Bangalore-Ii — Supreme Court of India, 27 May 2026. Superficial changes made to goods merely to facilitate their use, which do not alter their fundamental properties, do not amount to 'manufacture' creating a distinct product, and the burden of proving that the resulting…
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…
M/S Anax Air Services Pvt. Ltd vs Commissioner Of Customs New Delhi — Delhi High Court, 10 Apr 2026. A Customs Broker's contravention of the obligations under the CBLR attracts disciplinary sanction—revocation, forfeiture of security and penalty—even without proof of criminal intention, since the agent cannot plead…
The Principal Commissioner Of Customs vs M/S. Lucky Exports — Karnataka High Court, 12 Dec 2025. A person invoking an exemption notification must strictly comply with and clearly establish every condition of the notification, and in case of doubt or ambiguity the benefit goes to the State, not the assessee.
Principal Commissioner Of Customs, Bangalore vs M/S Pigeon International — Karnataka High Court, 26 Sep 2025. Penalty under Section 117 of the Customs Act, 1962 attracts on a plain contravention or failure to comply without any requirement of mens rea, and it operates in a domain distinct from Regulation 14 of the 2010 Courier…
Vicky Ramchand Asrani vs Mumbai-Air Port — CESTAT, 19 Dec 2024. Illicit import of gold must be deterred, but not by alienation of possession from its owner — where goods are merely restricted and not truly prohibited, absolute confiscation under section 125 fails and the owner is…
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…
Tecno Doors Pvt Ltd vs The Commissioner Of Customs — Madras High Court, 4 Apr 2018. Under the second proviso to sub-rule (2) of Rule 10 of the Customs Valuation (Determination of Value of Imported Goods) Rules, 2007, the freight cost includible in the assessable value of goods imported by air shall not…
Rabindra Chandra Paul vs Commr. Of Customs (Preventive)… — Supreme Court of India, 27 Feb 2007. Where the Department fails to establish any Rule 4(2) circumstance, the transaction value declared by the importer cannot be rejected, discounts uniformly available on commercial considerations cannot be denied under…
A S Chattha Exim Pvt Ltd vs Commissioner Of Customs (Port) — Calcutta High Court, 12 Oct 2026. A CESTAT order on classification, rate of duty or valuation cannot be challenged in the High Court under Section 130; the appeal lies directly to the Supreme Court under Section 130E.
The Principal Commissioner Of Customs vs M/S. Gimpex Limited — Telangana High Court, 11 Aug 2026. Where an exemption/policy provision is genuinely ambiguous and the importer proceeds on an interpretation later upheld by High Courts, there is no intent to evade duty, and the extended period of limitation under the…
Commissioner Of Customs (Preventive) vs I T C Global Holdings Pvt Ltd — Gujarat High Court, 5 Aug 2026. Burnt cars reduced to scrap are neither restricted 'commercial and passenger automobile vehicles' under the Negative List nor 'second hand goods', so their import is not liable to confiscation under Section 111(d), and…
M/S.Seaswan Shipping And Logistics vs The Commissioner Of Customs — Madras High Court, 15 Apr 2026. Where MEIS scrips granted by DGFT remain valid and unrevoked, customs authorities lack jurisdiction to initiate proceedings over their alleged misuse, and a mere mis-description of classification, without wilful intent,…
The Commissioner Of Customs vs Shri Regin.P — Madras High Court, 10 Feb 2026. An advance authorisation holder who diverts duty-free imports to unauthorised units and cannot produce true and proper accounts cannot claim compliance with the exemption notification, while a customs broker who merely…
M/S. Walchand Nagar Industries Ltd vs The Commissioner Of Customs — Madras High Court, 3 Dec 2025. Goods whose value declared in the Bill of Entry does not correspond to the proper assessable value are liable to confiscation under Section 111(m), and where the undervaluation is admitted, penalty under Section 112(a)…
Commissioner Of Customs General vs Direct Logistics And Export Co Ltd — Bombay High Court, 12 Nov 2025. At the admission stage of a Customs appeal under section 130, the High Court need only find that arguable questions of law arise and decides nothing on the merits, while interim arrangements such as continued investment…
Principal Commissioner Of Customs vs M/S Festo Controls Private Limited — Karnataka High Court, 23 Sep 2025. Under Section 28D of the Customs Act, 1962 read with Circulars 6/2008-Cus, 16/2008-Cus and 18/2010-Cus, a Chartered Accountant's certificate (from a CA who certifies the importer's annual accounts) that the burden of 4%…

All 30 judgments