CENGO INDIA ( DEDICATED TO ALL CENTRAL EXCISE, SERVICE TAX AND CUSTOMS GAZETTED EXECUTIVE OFFICERS)

MEMORANDUM

Before

The Study Group

Extraordinarily Acute Stagnation

for

Superintendents of

Central Excise

OUTLINES OF MEMORANDUM

PART-I: ABOUT THE DEPARTMENT

PART-II: THE CADRE OF SUPERINTENDENT OF CENTRAL EXCISE, CUSTOMS & SERVICE TAX

PART-III: APPEAL FOR REMOVAL OF EXTRAOERDINARILY ACUTE STAGNATION EXISTING IN THE CADRE OF CENTRAL EXCISE SUPERINTENDENT

(1) FRAMING OF RECRUITMENT RULES

(2) DIRECT PROMOTION TO STS POST

(3) INTRA ORGANISATIONAL PARITY

(4) INTRA DEPARTMENTAL PARITY

(5) INETR DEPARTMENTAL PARITY

(6) MERGER OF THREE GROUP ‘B’ EXECUTIVE NON GAZETTED AND ALSO GROUP ‘B’ EXECUTIVE GAZETTED STREAMS INTO ONE

(7) TIMELY CONDUCTION OF DPC

(8) REGULARISATION OF AD HOC PROMOTIONS

(9) INTRODUCTION OF FLEXIBLE PROMOTION/COMPLEMENTING SCHEME

(10) BATCH TO BATCH NON FUNCTIONAL FINANCIAL UPGRADATION TO THE CENTRAL EXCISE EXECUTIVE OFFICERS AT PAR WITH THE BEST PLACED COUNTERPARTS OF CSS ETC.

(11) PROMOTING ALL THE SUPERINTENDENTS WHO HAVE COMPLETED 1½ TIMES OF QUALIFYING SERVICE ON THE LINES OF CSS

(12) ENHANCEMENT OF PERCENTAGE OF PROMOTION QUOTA FROM 50% TO AT LEAST 90% IN GROUP A RECRUITMENT RULES

(13) UNIFORM PROMOTIONAL HIERARCHY

(14) TIMELY CADRE RESTRUCTURINGS

(15) AT LEAST FIVE FUNCTIONAL PROMOTIONS

(16) TIME SCALE AFTER EVERY 7 YEARS

(17) CREATION OF LEAVE RESERVE POSTS

(18) REMOVAL OF REGIONAL DISPARITIES

PART-I

ABOUT THE DEPARTMENT

The Ministry of Finance is responsible for the administration of the finance of the Central Government. It is concerned with all economic and financial matters affecting the country as a whole including mobility of resources for development. It regulates the expenditure of the Central Government including the transfer of resources to States. The Ministry comprises five Departments namely:

(a) Department of Economic Affairs;

(b) Department of Expenditure;

(d) Department of Disinvestment and

(e) Department of Financial Services.

2. The Department of Revenue exercises control on the matters relating to all direct and indirect taxes of the Union of India through two statutory Boards namely the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) and Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT). Matters relating to levy and collection of Central Excise duty, Service Tax & Customs duty and control over Narcotics fall within the purview of the CBEC, whereas those relating to the levy & collection of direct taxes are under the purview of the CBDT.

3. During 1963, the combined Board namely Board of Revenue was divided into CBEC and CBDT under the Central Board of Revenue Act, 1963. The Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) deals with the task of formulation of policies concerning levy and collection of Customs & Central Excise duties and Service Tax, prevention of smuggling and administration & control of matters relating to Customs, Central Excise & Service Tax, Narcotics, enforcement matters, economic intelligence, revenue intelligence, Central Excise & Service Tax intelligence, export promotion etc. It heads the organisations like Central Intelligence Economic Bureau, Central Bureau of Narcotics, formations for Control on Factories, formations for Adjudication & Review, National Academy of Customs, Excise & Narcotics, Directorate General of Revenue Intelligence, Directorate General of Central Excise Intelligence, Directorate General of Inspection, Directorate General of Systems & Data Management, Directorate General of Vigilance, Directorate General of Service Tax, Directorate General of Audit, Directorate General of Export Promotion, Directorate General of Safeguards, Directorate General of Valuation, Directorate General of Human Resource Development, Directorate of Data Management, Directorate of Logistics, Directorate of Legal Affairs, Directorate of Publicity & Public Relations, Large Tax Payer Units, Indirect Tax Ombudsmen, various field formations of Central Excise, Customs & Service Tax, Central Revenue Control Laboratory etc.

4. During financial year 2012-13, the indirect tax revenue collection was Rs. 4,74,575 crore . This indicates a growth of 20.9 % over actual collections in 2011-12 despite of general economic slowdown and relatively low level of industrial output in 2012-13.This increase was possible because of the dedicated & committed efforts made by all the Superintendents of Central Excise, Customs and Service Tax posted throughout the country. The major head wise details of indirect tax revenue collections during 2012-13 are tabulated below:

Major Tax Head	B.E 2012-13	R.E 2012-13	Actuals 2012-13 (prov.)	Growth over 2011 - 12	Collection over BE	Collection over RE
Customs	186694	164853	165289	10.7%	88.5%	100.3%
Union Excise	194350	171996	176685	21.3%	90.9%	102.7%
Service Tax	124000	132697	132601	36.0%	106.9%	99.9%
Total	505044	469546	474575	20.9%	94.0%	101 . 1%

5. Revenue Trends in 2013-14 (April-December): The Budget Estimate (BE) for 2013-14 for indirect tax has been pegged at Rs. 5,65,003 crore, which is about 19.0% higher than the revenue receipts of previous year. The major head wise details of indirect tax revenue collection during 2013-14 fiscal year upto December, 2013 is tabulated as under-

Indirect Tax Major Head	Budget Estimate 2013-14	Revenue Collections *April to December 2013
Indirect Tax Major Head	Budget Estimate 2013-14	2012-13	2013-14	Growth (in %)	%BE Achieved (Up-to
					Dec,2013)
Customs	187308	118393	126285	6.7	67.4
Central Excise	197554	124016	118405	(-)4.5	59.9
Service Tax	180141	91900	110313	20.0	61.2
Total	565003	334309	355003	6.2	62.8

6. Voluntary Compliance Encouragement Scheme, 2013 (VCES): In Service Tax, a new scheme was introduced to encourage voluntary compliance with the following main features:

(i)The scheme can be availed by non-filers or stop-filers or persons who have not made a truthful declaration in their return. However, it will not be applicable to persons against whom any inquiry or investigation is pending by the issue of search warrant or summon or by way of audit;

(ii)The defaulter will be required to make a truthful declaration of all his pending tax dues (from 1^st October, 2007 to 31^st December, 2012) and pay at least half of it before 31^st December, 2013 and remaining half to be paid by:

(a) 30^th June, 2014 without interest; or

(b) By 31^st December, 2014 with interest from 1^st July, 2014 onwards;

(iii) On compliance with all the requirements, the person will have immunity from interest (as specified), penalties and other proceedings.

7. Arrests and Prosecutions: Section 104 of the Customs Act, 1962 contains provisions relating to arrest. This section has been amended to make certain offences punishable under section 135 as non-bailable. The offences are:

(A) Evasion or attempted evasion of duty exceeding rupees fifty lakh;

(B) Clearance of prohibited goods notified under section 11 which are also notified under sub-clause (C) of clause (i) of sub-section (1) of section 135;

(C) Import or Export of any goods which have not been declared in accordance with the provisions of this Act and the market price of which exceeds rupees one crore;

(D) Fraudulently availing of or attempt to avail of drawback or any exemption from duty provided under this Act, if the amount of drawback or exemption from duty exceeds rupees fifty lakh.

7.1 Barring the offences mentioned above, all other offences under the Customs Act are bailable. Similar changes have been made in the Central Excise Act, 1944 and Finance Act, 1994 (relating to Service Tax).

8. Anti-Smuggling Unit: The Anti-Smuggling Unit (AS Unit) of CBEC provides an enabling environment to officers working in DRI (Directorate of Revenue Intelligence), DGCEI (Directorate General of Central Excise Intelligence) and other field formations of CBEC by providing anti-smuggling equipments, vehicles, updated policy guidelines and procedures regarding operations to detect and curb evasion of Central Excise duty, Service Tax & Customs duty, frauds relating to revenue evasion and augmenting Govt. revenue. In the financial year 2013-14 (upto Sept, 2013), the following achievements were made and initiatives taken by the Anti-Smuggling Unit-

a) To curb duty evasion on overseas, India has signed Customs Mutual Assistance Agreements (CMAAs) and Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) with other countries for sharing of intelligence and availing investigation assistance. The Customs Overseas Intelligence Network (COIN) provides actionable intelligence for facilitating seizures of offending goods and to detect evasion of Customs duty. COIN also utilises the platform provided through CMAAs/MoUs to obtain documentary evidences in this regard. Presently nine COIN units are operational abroad. Efforts are being made to create seven more COIN units in consultation with Ministry of External Affairs.

b) The Directorate General of Revenue Intelligence (DRI), interalia, disseminates information about new modus operandi of duty evaders and smugglers by sharing details of important cases booked by it through issue of alert circulars. The alert circulars are also used for targeting in the Risk Management Framework. The field formations and DRI also share the information /intelligence and details of cases with other agencies directly as well as by reporting to the Central Economic Intelligence Bureau (CEIB) and at the meetings of Regional Economic Intelligence Council (REIC). Policy directions issued by the Finance Minister in the Economic Intelligence Council (EIC) meetings are circulated by Anti-Smuggling Unit to DRI, DGCEI and field formations for compliance.

c) The National Import Data Base (NIDB) and Export Commodity Data Base (ECDB) help in detecting under-valuation/misdeclaration of imported/exported goods, which are reported to be the oft-used route for Customs commercial frauds and Trade Based Money Laundering (TBML). The Intelligence Support System (ISS) developed by DRI generates workable intelligence by analysing macro-level inputs which helps in detection of commercial frauds, evasion of Customs duty and misuse of export incentives. Trends in smuggling report are issued from time to time for the guidance of the field formations.

d) The list of sensitive commodities prone to smuggling are circulated to field formations on the basis of the cases detected in the past. These include Narcotics & other Psychotropic Substances, Gold, FICN, Red Sanders and Memory Cards etc. The major commodities prone to the evasion in terms of commercial frauds are Betel Nuts, Parts & Accessories, Non Edible Crude Palm Oil, Iron Ore Concentrate, Aircrafts, Cigarettes, Ozone Depleting Substances (R-22 Gas), Garments & Accessories etc.

e) As part of the institutional support for the field formations, revised Arrest Guidelines have been issued, Annual Action Plan for acquisition of anti-smuggling equipments has been prepared, the norms for weapon requirement for field formations have been finalised and Indian Customs Canine Squad Manual for a Sniffer Dog Establishment has been issued.

9. Anti-Smuggling Performance at a Glance: Supported with the above logistics and institutional support, the DRI and field formations of CBEC have performed well. The results achieved include details of seizures made, commercial fraud cases detected, persons arrested and persons detained by Customs authorities. These are the major achievements by all Superintendents of Central Excise, Customs and Service Tax posted throughout the country. The Performance is mentioned as below-

S. No.	Item of work	2011-12		2012-13		2013-14 upto Sep, 2013
		Number	Value/Duty	Number	Value/duty	Number	Duty
1	Seizures	25537	4522.89	28317	3079.43	7561	25535.71
	Gold	486	46.43	871	99.34	299	6237.37
	Narcotics	480	1711.93	470	969.15	113	13726.45
	FICN(Face Value)	25	2.64	21	2.23	00	00
	Others	23797	728.37	26375	386.24	7149	5571.89
	Commercial Frauds	749	2033.52	580	1622.47	112	31107.79
2	Commercial Fraud Cases Detected	5333	2198.20	5390	5970.38	864	17812.76
	Under Valuation	558	498.84	1961	320.2	71	647.42
	Mis-declaration	1386	913.32	1217	2673.12	240	5737.93
	Misuse of DEEC/Advance License Scheme	6	14.02	11	139.99	1	18.78
	Misuse of DEPB Scheme	59	25.42	18	22.94	0	0
	Misuse of EPCG Scheme	30	82.41	25	231.85	2	373.32
	Misuse of EOU/EPZ/SEZ Scheme	9	9.88	9	44.13	1	6.13
	Misuse of Drawback Scheme	138	31.06	175	825.82	38	3575.16
	Misuse of end-use & other notifications	104	343.34	220	1609.92	67	1363.48
	Others	3043	279.91	1754	102.41	482	9665.70
3	Duty Recovered	6243	610.63	6757	1603.52	976	4656.96
4	Persons arrested	597		575		231
5	Persons detained	35		28		5

9.1 So far the seizures made and persons arrested are the highest in numbers in comparison to other Central Government Departments such as Income Tax, BSF, CRPF, CBI, IB, CISF, ITBP etc. during the relevant period.

10. Litigation & Adjudication Policy: The CBEC has taken several measures to streamline the process of departmental adjudication and litigation before various appellate authorities and judicial fora. These include:

(a) Creation of six additional benches of CESTAT in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Allahabad, Chandigarh and Hyderabad.

(b) The monetary limit of single member bench has been increased from Rs 10 lakh to Rs 15 lakh in the Finance Act, 2013.

(c) Several changes have been made in the procedure for examination of the proposals to file the SLP in the Supreme Court. This has been done with a view to avoid filing of SLP in a mechanical manner on frivolous grounds resulting in less number of SLPs and civil appeals filed in Supreme Court in 2012-13 as compared to previous year.

11. Drawback Division: It performs the following functions-

i. Fixation of all Industry rates of Duty Drawback;

ii. Monitoring of sanction and disbursal of drawback by the field formations; and

iii. Liaison with the DGFT on all export promotion (EP) schemes, their operations and monitoring (except SEZ, EOU and Gem & Jewellery schemes which are being monitored by the DGEP).

12. Achievements of Drawback Division during the calendar year 2013: The major work done by the Drawback Division during the period 01.01.2013 to 31.12.2013 is as follows:

12.1 Foreign Trade Policy-

(A) The import of catalyst was allowed under EPCG Authorization vide Notification No. 3/2013- Customs dated 13.02.2013.

(B) Vishakhapatnam Airport and Kattupalli (Tamil Nadu) port were included in the list of Airports/ports in Export Promotion Customs Notifications vide Notification No. 4/2013-Customs dated 14.02.2013 and Notification No. 20/2013-Customs dated 03.04.2013 respectively.

(C) Two Notifications numbered as 5/2013-Customs and 6/2013-Customs both dated 18.02.2013 were issued to implement post export EPCG duty credit scheme under chapters of Foreign Trade Policy (FTP).

(D) Two Notifications numbered as 2/2013-Central Excise and 3/2013-Central Excise both dated 18.02.2013 were issued to enable the use of duty credit scrips (granted under post export EPCG Duty Credit Scheme under the chapters of the FTP) for procuring goods from domestic manufacturers by debit of Central Excise duties in the scrip subject to conditions specified in the exemption Notifications.

(E) Norms for execution of bank guarantee in respect of EPCG schemes were relaxed vide Circular No. 8/2013 dated 04.03.2013.

(F) The changes announced in the Annual Supplement 2013-14 to the Foreign Trade Policy 2009-14 by the Ministry of Commerce on 18^th April, 13 were implemented vide Notifications numbered as 21/2013-Cus, 22/2013-Cus, 23/2013-Cus, 24/2013-Cus, 14/2013-Central Excise, 15/2013-Central Excise, 6/2013-Service Tax, 7/2013-Service Tax, 8/2013-Service Tax all dated 18.4.13, 17/2013-Central Excise & 29/2013-Cus both dated 16.5.13, 32/2013-Customs, 21/2013-Central Excise & 11/2013-Service Tax all dated 13.6.13 and 46/2013-Customs dated 26.09.13. The changes implemented are as below:-

i. A single zero duty EPCG scheme for all sectors was notified. This rationalized and harmonized the earlier two EPCG schemes of zero and 3% duty. The definition of 'export obligation' has been made stricter. Units in Jammu and Kashmir have been permitted lowered specific EO like the units of North Eastern States and Sikkim. The restrictions on simultaneously availing TUFS and single zero duty EPCG have been removed. Consequently, a single Post Export EPCG Duty Credit Scrip Scheme was also notified. In this, all duties are paid in cash at time of import and the basic duty is granted as remission in the form of duty credit scrip in proportion to export obligation fulfilled.

ii. The usage of duty credit scrips that would be issued under the Incremental Exports Incentivisation Scheme on annual basis for 2013-14 (a variant of the Focus Market Scheme) was notified by amendment to Focus Market Scheme;

iii) The freely transferable reward scrips (FMS, FPS and VKGUY) were enabled for utilization for payment of Service Tax on procurement of services;

iv) Import of cars etc. as commercially registered Tourist Vehicles for hotel and tourism industry was brought under usage of Served from India Scheme (SFIS) scrip and it was deleted from the EPCG scheme.

v. Exemption from anti-dumping duty and safeguard duty under Duty Free Import Authorization (DFIA) was made applicable only in case of actual user. On transfer of DFIA this facility was withdrawn.

vi. Under Served from India Scheme (SFIS) duty credit scrips in the case of service provider who is also engaged in manufacturing activity, the import of capital goods including spares related to its manufacturing sector business has been permitted subject to certain conditions.

vii. In the case of Agri. Infrastructure Incentive Scrip (AIIS) issued to Status Holders, transferability of the scrip to a supporting manufacturer has been allowed subject to conditions.

viii. Under Status Holders Incentive Scrip (SHIS) issued to Status Holders, the transferability of the duty credit scrip has been allowed within the group company which is a manufacturer subject to conditions.

ix. 36 Notifications pertaining to Advance Licenses, DEEC, Advance Authorisations, DFIA and EPCG Schemes for the Policy period 1992-1997 to 2004-2009 amended for implementing the option to close cases of default in EO notified by the DGFT.

(G) Foreign Post Office, New Delhi included as port of export in Export Promotion Customs Notifications vide Notification No. 38/2013-Customs dated 26.07.2013.

13. Drawback Schedule: The All Industry Rates of Duty Drawback Schedule 2013-14 has been notified w.e.f. 21.09.13 vide Notification No. 98/2013-Cus (N.T.) dated 14.09.13. The salient features of the Schedule are:-

(A) All Industry Rate (AIR) of Duty Drawback on many items that were already covered under the drawback schedule prior to incorporation of erstwhile DEPB items have been reduced and on a few items like gold and silver jewellery, silk yarn, silk fabric, silk garments & made-ups, wooden artwares etc. have been increased.

(B) The residuary AIR of 1% (composite) and 0.3% (Customs) has been provided to hitherto Nil rated items under chapters 4, 15 & 22, few items in chapter 24 and casein & its derivatives in chapter 35. AIR has also been provided to articles of silver (silversmiths wares) subject to similar conditions as applicable to gold/silver jewellery and the Notes and Conditions (22)/(23) of the said Notification shall also have relevance.

(C) The specific rate provided to Ethanol/ENA under tariff item No. 22071090 has been changed to ad valorem 1% (composite) and 0.3% (Customs). Ad valorem rates have been provided to certain items of chapter 37 and imitation jewellery of chapter 71.

(D) Though the existing residuary rate of 1% ad valorem (composite) and 0.3% (Customs) continues, the higher residuary rates have been reduced from 1.5% to 1.3% (Customs) or from 2% to 1.7% (Customs) as the case may be.

(E) The process of realignment of rates on items incorporated in the drawback schedule from the erstwhile DEPB scheme was continued along with rationalizing these rates. In general, AIR on these items has been reduced including some to the applicable residuary rate. In the case of certain electronic goods of chapter 84, 85 &93, the residuary rate has been provided at 1% (Customs).

(F) In the case of the most tariff items with ad valorem all industry rates above 2%, the rates have been supplemented with drawback caps.

(G) Separate tariff entries have been created for cotton bags, grey and dyed knitted fabrics of cotton, of MMF, of blend where cotton predominates and of blends where MMF predominates, grey and dyed cotton fabrics with lycra, womens’/girls' tops, embroidered fabrics of MMF, imitation jewellery of glass, multi-speed complete bicycle with geared hubs, cranks made of aluminum, single speed chain wheel and crank (crank made of aluminum), pillows/cushions/quilts/pouffes filled with poly-fil/polyfill etc. A few tariff items have also been replicated with same rates and caps under different four digit levels and descriptions of certain tariff items have been modified to address classification issues.

(H) AIR of Duty Drawback has been provided on milk, milk products, casein and its derivatives and AIR withdrawn on wheat.

14. Other aspects relating to Drawback: Vide instructions dated 11.10.13, Board instructions dated 26.08.05 issued vide F.No. 609/110/2005-DBK regarding grant of provisional brand rate were reiterated and a time limit of seven days was fixed for issue of provisional brand rate letter in case of claim is made under Rule 7 of the Drawback Rules, 1995.

15. Reforms and Trade Facilitation Measures: CBEC has been an early starter in introducing reforms. Substantial reforms have already been carried out in the Central Excise laws and procedures since 1994. The object of these reforms was to repose a greater trust in the tax-payers and bring about a substantial improvement in the delivery system and compliance through automation and trade facilitation measures. CBEC has also undertaken a number of e-governance initiatives with the objective of improving tax-payer services, transparency, accountability and efficiency in the indirect tax administration of India. These applications have automated all major processes in Customs, Central Excise and Service Tax through web-based and workflow-based systems reducing the physical interface between the tax payers and the Departmental officers, thereby reducing discretion and opportunity for corrupt practices. Details of the important trade facilitation measures are as below:

15.1 Customs: Customs has initiated meaningful and effective trade facilitation that reduces transaction costs through the following measures for tax payers-

15.1(i) Automation in Customs: CBEC had modified the Indian Customs EDI System (ICES) in 2009 which has been launched in 109 Customs locations in the country. The Indian Customs EDI Gateway (ICEGATE), the gateway portal, hosts a number of services for the EDI partners and provides facilities for e-filing of documents from anywhere at any time (24/7). ICEGATE and ICES 1.5 are serving about 6.7 lakh importers/exporters and handling nearly 98% of International trade of India. CBEC is among the first Departments that has adopted Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) framework to provide IT services to end-users in a consistent manner. The following taxpayer services have been provided to the importers and exporters:-

a) E-filing of Bills of Entry, Shipping Bills, IGM/EGM with electronic acknowledgements.

b) An Accredited Clients Programme (ACP) whereby trusted importers are extended the facility of fast track Customs clearance.

c) Connectivity with 17 types of stakeholders such as Custodian, Port Authorities, Shipping Lines, Airlines, Customs Brokers, DGFT, Banks and other Government agencies through electronic messages. This eliminates the need for paper movement across agencies and across locations.

d) Facility of electronic payment of duties.

e) Selective appraisement and examination through the Risk Management System (RMS).

f) Facility of filing of Bills of Entry and Shipping Bills through Service Centers.

g) Documents processed on ‘first come, first-served’ basis and status can be tracked.

h) Drawback is directly credited to bank accounts of exporters.

i) Electronic Refund of Service Tax paid on exports.

j) Uniform applicability of duty rates and trade policy across the country.

k) Centralized Bond Management and elimination of Release Advices has enabled traders to file bond at any location and affect clearance from any other location.

l) Electronic transmission of Shipping Bills to DGFT and online receipt of licenses has reduced physical interface with the Department and has also reduced time and cost of transaction.

m) Round the clock Helpdesk with toll-free number.

n) Automated Recording and Targeting System (ARTS) provides protection of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR).

15.1 (ii) Self Assessment: Self Assessment of Customs duty by importers or exporters was introduced vide Finance Act, 2011. This is a paradigm shift from assessment by Departmental officers to a trust based system of self-assessment. The objective is to expedite release of imported/exported goods. The interest of revenue in terms of ensuring correct declarations and duty payment is ensured by an electronic Risk Management System (RMS) that identifies risky consignments for assessment or examination or both. The shift to Self Assessment is aimed at increasing the facilitation level of consignments imported through Air, Sea and Inland Container Depots (ICDs) from the present 60%, 50% and 40% to 80%, 70% and 60% respectively.

15.1(iii) On Site Post Clearance Audit (OSPCA) Scheme: The scheme for On Site Post Clearance Audit (OSPCA) has been implemented for importers registered under the Customs Accredited Client Programme (ACP). This scheme is aimed at facilitating Customs clearance of goods and reducing dwell time. At the same time, revenue is safeguarded by a comprehensive verification of records and documents at the premises of the importer/exporter on annual basis. Other categories of importers/exporters will be considered for inclusion later.

15.1(iv) Authorized Economic Operator Programme: Indian Customs Authorized Economic Operator (AEO) Programme has been developed pursuant to World Customs Organization adoption of SAFE Framework of Standards. The programme aims to provide businesses in international supply chain with an internationally recognized quality work highlighting a business role in a secured supply chain and compliance to laws. The full fledged Indian AEO programme was rolled out by the CBEC in 2012 and currently 16 applications are being processed at AEO centers at Regional Units as well as Headquarters. The pamphlets, posters and advertisements have been circulated amongst the field formations and local newspapers through the Directorate of Publicity & Public Relations for wide publicity of AEO programme. Trade sensitization programmes in zones is currently underway.

15.1(v) 24x7 Customs Clearance:

i. In order to facilitate importers and exporters, CBEC began 24x7 Customs clearance from 2012 at identified Air Cargo Complexes, viz., Bangalore, Chennai, Delhi and Mumbai and Sea Ports viz., Nhava Sheva, Kandla, Chennai and Kolkata in respect of certain categories of imports and exports. This facility has now been extended and presently covers 17 Air Cargo Complexes and 4 Sea Ports.

ii. Clearance of indigenously manufactured goods has been allowed to Duty Free Shops located in the arrival and departure halls of the international airports. The permissible allowance including the restrictions and prohibitions, if any applicable to passengers and members of crew for purchase of the indigenous goods is governed by the same Baggage Rules that govern the imported goods.

iii. Risk Management System (RMS) for exports was introduced with effect from 15.07.2013 at ICD’s of Patparganj and Mulund. The aim is to expedite the flow of export of goods and reduce dwell time & port congestion by limiting examination to the risky consignments on the basis of risk parameters.

15.1(vi) International Customs Division: The proposal to defreeze the tariff values of imported edible oils (which had not been revised since August 2006), was implemented on receiving approval of CCEA. This is also a revenue positive measure as it resulted in increase in the tariff values by over 70%. Tariff value has been introduced on Arecanut to curb under-valuation. The value of the most of the imported consignments was earlier being declared in the range of US $ 700-800 per MT. The present tariff value is US $ 1816/MT. This department has taken a central role in coordinating with various border agencies for facilitation of trade at land borders. This includes holding educational seminars for stake holders on regulatory requirements and pursuing issues of OGA requirements with other Ministries for resolution. Section 69 of the Customs Act, 1962 was amended to allow for re-export of goods through Post imported earlier by any mode of transport and warehoused. This could help Indian FPO to become a major transit hub. A scheme for allowing exports through Posts under Export Promotion Reward Schemes has been operationalised.

15.1(vii) Interactive website: Indian Customs has developed a user friendly interactive website to enable importers/exporters to know tariff classification, applicable rate of Customs duty and other regulatory requirements for clearance of goods. Interactive website is an effective tool to help educate traders for making correct assessment of duty after introduction of self assessment in Customs.

15.2 Central Excise and Service Tax: CBEC has implemented the Automation of Central Excise and Service Tax (ACES) project, a Mission Mode Project (MMP) of the Govt. of India under the National e-Governance Plan. ACES has transformed the way for about 20 lakh indirect taxpayers to conduct their business with the Department. The application has been rolled-out Nationally in 2009 in all 104 Commissionerates throughout the country.

15.2(i) The following Taxpayer Services are provided under ACES:

i. Online PAN-based Registration of Central Excise & Service Tax assessees and online amendment. ACES provides for online validation of PAN with the Income Tax database. When any taxpayer enters a wrong PAN, the system will indicate the same.

ii. Electronic filing of claims, permissions, intimations and processing thereof.

iii. Instant e-acknowledgement of documents with Document Identification Number.

iv. Viewing, filing and tracking the status of documents online.

v. Facility of e-Payment and checking status online.

vi. Online revenue reconciliation.

vii. Online messages/alerts to users on business related matters.

viii. Online information to assessees about issuance of Show Cause Notice, personal hearing and orders passed by Adjudicating Authorities.

ix. Online filing of replies to Show cause Notices.

x. Online filing of application for provisional assessment.

xi. Online filing and processing of refund claims.

xii. Online filing of selected Export related documents.

15.2(ii) Simplified Service Tax refund procedure: A simplified electronic Service Tax refund mechanism beneficial to the exporting community, especially merchant exporters, was introduced wherein the tax refund process being dealt with by the designated Central Excise and Service Tax officers is electronically enabled under the Customs application-ICES 1.5.

15.3 SEVOTTAM: As a part of the Central Government initiative to improve the quality of public services, the Central Board of Excise & Customs (CBEC) has been identified as one of the 10 organizations with large citizen interface to implement the quality management system for public services. This is based on Indian Standard IS 15700:2005, prepared by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) under the name of "SEVOTTAM". As such at present 13 offices under CBEC are Sevottam certified and 8 more Sevottam offices are ready for certification of Audit. The Department has also selected 47 Commissionerates for Phase-III roll out.

15.4 E-Helpline: CBEC has launched e-helpline facility at the Zonal levels for clarifying the doubts of trade and industry in an administration friendly manner without the assessee having to come to offices of the Department. Taxpayers can also use the e-helpline for resolving procedural delays.

16. Involvement with other countries on tax matters:

16.1 Cooperation with BRIGS countries: The heads of revenue of BRIGS countries, i.e., Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, met in New Delhi on 17^th and 18^th January, 13 and held discussions on issues relating to International taxation, transfer pricing, prevention of cross-border tax evasion and avoidance, exchange of information, sharing of best practices in tax system administration and resolution of disputes. This was the first meeting of the heads of revenue. On conclusion of the meeting, a joint communiqué was issued in which the revenue heads of BRIGS countries agreed to develop greater cooperation on various issues of mutual interest and concerns.

16.2 India-Brazil-South Africa (IBSA) revenue administration working group meeting: IBSA dialogue forum is a trilateral development initiative between India, Brazil and South Africa to promote South-South co-operation and bring together three democracies to promote closer co-operation in both tax & Customs matters and contribute to the IBSA dialogue forum. 8th meeting of IBSA Heads of Revenue Administrations Working Group (HRAWG) was held on 8th November, 13 and the 11th meeting of IBSA Revenue Administrations Steering Group (RASG) was held on 4^th to 7^th November, 13 at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Cooperation in the areas of International taxation and transfer pricing, exchange of information, cooperation in multilateral fora, digital economy, aggressive tax planning and capacity building were identified and sub-groups have been constituted to work in these areas for enhanced cooperation.

16.3 United Nations TP Manual: The UN Transfer Pricing Manual was released in May, 2013 and is expected to address the concerns of developing countries. India being one of the important developing countries/emerging economies played an active role in the drafting of this Manual.

16.4 Coordination with other Multilateral Agencies: India is an Associate member of Center for Inter American Tax Administration (CIAT), a multilateral organization. The efforts of CIAT are focused on cooperation between the tax administrations of different jurisdictions with a view to work jointly against international tax evasion. To fulfill this objective, CIAT organizes different activities, studies, workshops, seminars etc. wherein the tax administrations can share their suggestions, practices, experiences etc.

16.5 The Commonwealth Association of Tax Administrators (CATA): It was established as the result of a decision taken at the meeting of the Commonwealth Finance Ministers in Barbados in 1977. India has been an important member of it since 1979. Its activities include organizing annual technical workshops, high quality training programmes for tax officials, in country training programmes tailored to meet the specific needs of members, publication of a quarterly Newsletter, provisions of consultancy services & research facilities for members on request, the supply of information to members etc.

16.5 Indian delegation also attended the ITD Global Conference on Tax and Inter-governmental Relations from 3^rdto 5^thDecember, 2013 at Marrakech, Morocco and made a presentation.

17. CBEC consists of two separate and distinct cadre formations. The core sub-ordinate cadre could be considered at the bottom and Indian Customs & Central Excise Service/IRS could be considered at the top. The top management cadre is composed of the officers initially recruited as Assistant Commissioners (direct) and promoted to the level of Chairman and Members of CBEC. Top level is followed by second level of management at the field formations in the grades of the Assistant Commissioner to Principal Chief Commissioner. The core sub-ordinate cadre consists of Superintendents and Appraisers. Intake in the core sub-ordinate cadre is at the level of Inspector, Preventive officers and Examiners which are Group ‘B’ posts belonging to same grade of Inspector. The Inspectors of Central Excise, Preventive officers and Examiner are promoted to the grade of Superintendent of Central Excise, Superintendent of Customs (Preventive) and Appraisers of Customs respectively belonging to Group ‘B’ gazetted executive grade.

18. Though the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) deals with the task of policy formulation and administration of indirect taxes through levy and collection of Central Excise duty, Customs duty, Service Tax & other miscellaneous indirect taxes and matters relating to Narcotics, yet CBEC has focused attention on prevention of smuggling of the contraband goods being a serious threat to National security due to recent shift in commodities being smuggled from traditional items like gold, silver, watches etc. to arms, ammunition, explosives, fake Indian currency, Narcotics etc. The major responsibility in the area of Central Excise is the prevention of leakages & evasions in revenues and providing smooth & efficient flow of collections. By revenue points of view, the CBEC is the highest revenue earning source for the Union of India having no parallels for years.

19. In the last 10 years the assessee base has grown by 150% in Central Excise (Table T 19-1) and a phenomenal 570% in Service Tax (Table T 19-2). During the same period Central Excise revenue has increased by 80% (though inclusive of CENVAT credit the growth counts to 160% - Table T 19-3) and Service Tax revenue has grown by 90% (5 years data – Table T 19-4 Inclusive of CENVAT credit it comes to 80% and assessee base has grown by 50%.).

Table T 19-1

Table T 19-2

Table T 19-3

Table T 19-4

PART-II

THE CADRE OF SUPERINTENDENT OF CENTRAL EXCISE, CUSTOMS & SERVICE TAX

Superintendent cadre is a Group ‘B’ Executive (Gazetted) cadre in the hierarchy of CBEC. A Superintendent on Central Excise front is required to know the basic composition and manufacturing processes of large number of commodities to ascertain the exact nature of classification of the product, feasibility of manufacturing in the declared premises and its eligibility to levy alongwith eligibility to different exemptions to arrive at correct rate of duty. A Superintendent of Central Excise must know the requirement of input raw materials and production norms of each & every product so as to keep watch & control over the behavior or pattern of credits availed and evasion of tax. A little unawareness of the fact leads to siphoning of Govt. revenue in unthinkable proportion. All the works pertaining to levy & collection of duty, other aspects like export, drawback, free trade zone, 100% Export Units, refund, prevention of revenue leakage, collection of intelligence, investigation of hidden facts and conclusion of assessment are day-to-day works of Superintendents on Central Excise front. The Superintendent is accountable for any commission or omission having his/her job always at the risk. As middle rung supervisory executive, all such responsibilities are solely entrusted upon Superintendents.

On Customs front, a Superintendent deals with the import, export, examination, appraising of value, prevention of smuggling and many other activities of highly technical nature mostly relating to International Trade and Commerce. New concepts on Tariffs and Trade having International ramifications are dealt with by the Superintendent. The exploration of areas of services involving Service Tax by service providers and the scrutiny of returns to conclude assessment are the look outs of the Superintendent in the Service Tax for which they are solely responsible and accountable. The Superintendents also adjudicate the cases against revenue offenders. They have to counter with the hardcore & dreaded smugglers, white collared criminals, habitual & chronic revenue offenders during the course of disposal of their executive and judicial duties. The Superintendent of Central Excise has to work as Investigating authority, Intelligence authority, Advocate, Judge, Scientist, Chemist, Technical Officer, Accountant, Auditor, executive, revenue officer, consultant, advisor, help desk, National Security Guard etc. during the course of fulfilment of his responsibilities.

2. Canadian Audit has been introduced in CBEC in the scheme known as EA 2000. This scheme is based on modern techniques and higher responsibilities. Under the scheme, there is almost a rate of 50% growth on the spot recovery during the last 8 years. Like Senior Audit Offices of AG Office under the pay scale of Rs. 8000-13500/- or equivalent, the Superintendents of Central Excise are heading the Audit teams. The functions relating to desk review and preparation of audit plans of highly technical nature alongwith long audits in the fields are being conducted by the Superintendents of Central Excise. Now in the era of liberalization, the CBEC has focused on Prevention and Audit instead of conventional control. In the Preventive set-up, Superintendent is functioning as a team leader like the DSP/ASP of the CBI and DCIO/AD of IB. The investigations and intelligence are the integral part of their duties. It is the only reason that they can go on deputation to the CBI and IB to work on analogous posts DSP, DCIO etc. The work of the Central Excise Superintendent require specific expertise. The officers from no department are entitled to work on this post for the want of the said specific expertise. In EA 2000 Audit, the work and responsibilities of Superintendent of Central Excise are at par with the Senior Audit Officer of AG Office.

3. In the back-drop of such onerous responsibilities being carried by each Superintendent of Central Excise, Customs & Service Tax, it is humbly put forth before the Hon’ble Commission that every Superintendent performs his/her work responsibilities at the cost of life of self as well as family being countered with the hardcore & dreaded smugglers, white collared criminals, chronic habitual offenders of revenue & law etc. including other hard core criminals. Apart from the above, Superintendents are dealing with and are responsible for strict implementation of several Acts having bearing on levy and collection of revenue. A few of such Acts are given below among others-

i) The Customs Act, 1962.

ii) The Central Excise Act, 1944.

iii) The Central Excise Tariff Act, 1985.

iv) The Factories Act, 1948.

v) The Medical and Toilet Preparation (Excise Duty) Act, 1955.

vi) The Companies Act, 1956.

vii) The Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Policies Act, 1969.

viii) The General Clauses Act, 1897.

ix) The Khadi and other Handloom Industries Development (Additional Excise duty on Cloth) Act, 1953.

x) The Textile Committee Act, 1963.

xi) The Additional Duties Excise (Goods of Special Importance) Act, 1957.

xii) All Cess Acts.

xiii) The Service Taxes provisions introduced through the Finance Act, 1994.

xiv) The Indian Contract Act, 1872.

xv) The Sale of Goods Act.

xvi) The Finance Act, 1994.

xvii) The Import and Export Trade Control Act.

xviii) The Foreign Exchange Regulation Act (FEMA).

xix) The Conservation of Foreign Exchange and Prevention of Smuggling Act (COFEPOSA).

xx) The Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.

xxi) The Merchant Shipping Act.

xxii) The Indian Petroleum Act.

xxiii) The Indian Tariff Act.

xxiv) The Arms Act.

xxv) The Opium Act.

xxvi) The Destructive Pests and Insects Act.

xxvii) The Antiquities Export (Control) Act.

xxviii) The Indian Penal Code.

xxix) The Code of Criminal Procedure.

xxx) The Indian Evidence Act.

xxxi) The Merchandise Mark Act.

xxxii) The Customs Tariff Act.

xxxiii) All Finance Acts etc. etc.

4. The job description of Superintendents of Central Excise as enumerated above is not elaborative/exhaustive but only indicative of the huge responsibilities with regard to activities bearing upon levy and collection of taxes in three vital segments of indirect taxation, i.e., Central Excise, Customs & Service Tax and related technicalities & procedures involved therein. The jobs performed by Superintendents in the fields for prevention of smuggling and fighting against smugglers & drug traffickers both on land & boarders entail risk of life and are completely hazardous & arduous by any standards. The High Power Committee in its findings read with letter dated 27.10.1995 of CBEC has unequivocally conceded to it. The Gazetted Executive officers of the Revenue Department in general and Superintendents of Central Excise, Service tax & Customs in particular are performing certain specialized work. For comparison of similar level post in other Departments, it can be said that the duties & responsibilities of these posts are more hazardous & arduous than the posts of DSP/ASP of CBI and DCIO/AD of IB or any comparable post of any other Department.

5. The Superintendents are mainly responsible for collection of the huge revenue in the form of Central Excise duty, Customs duty and Service Tax. The performance of the CBEC based on the committed & dedicated efforts of the Superintendents are furnished below:

Growth in Revenue Collection since 2002-03 (in Rs. Crores)

Sources of Revenue	2002-03	2011-12	2012- 13	2013-14 (BE)	% Growth over 2002-03 in 2011-12	% Growth over 2002-03 in 2012-13	% Growth over 2002-03 in 2013-14 (E)
Central Excise	87383	150695	171996	197554	72.45	96.8	122.60
Service Tax	5000	95000	132697	180141	1800	2553	3502
Customs	45500	153000	164853	187308	236.26	262.31	311.66
Total	137883	398695	469546	565003	189.16	240.53	309.76

Increase in Workload since 2002-03

Work Indicators	2002-03	2010-11	2011-12	% Growth since 2002-03
No. of Service Tax Assessees	1,33,531	16,30,317	18,17,415	1261%
No. of Central Excise Units	79,770	3,60,968	3,96,118	397%
No. of Import Export Documents	37,40,970	1,25,88,909	1,36,94,901	266%
No. of Factory Stuffed Containers	1,00,000	10,80,000	12,00,000	1100%
No. of International Passengers	94,00,000	3,79,00,000	4,15,00,000	341%

Other parameters of increase in workload

Function		2004-05		2011-12		% Growth in Value / Duty
Function		Number of cases	Value / Duty (In Rs crore)	Number of cases	Value / Duty (In Rs. crore)
Anti-smuggling	Seizures	45424	859.31	25537	4523	426
Anti-smuggling	Duty Evasion	1033	1080	5333	2198	104
Anti-evasion	Duty Evasion	7217	3240	7182	15594	381
Audit	Duty Detection	21313	1661	33769	11727	606

Increase in number of sub-formations

Areas	2002-03	2011-12	%age increase
Number of ICDs/CFSs	154	262	70.13%
Airports/Air Cargos	33	39	18.18%
Major Seaports	12	12	0
Minor Seaports	49	84	71.42%
Foreign Post Office	9	10	11.11%
Integrated Check Post	0	2 @	New Formation
LTU	0	5	New Formation

@ (5 more ICP’s are likely to be operational soon.)

DUTIES & WORK RESPONSIBILITIES OF CENTRAL EXCISE SUPERINTENDENT

(A) SCHEDULE OF WORK AND STATUTORY OBLIGATIONS OF SUPERINDENT OF CENTRAL EXCISE

1. Drawal of samples for correct classification.

2. Determination of value of the goods for assessment. With the introduction of transaction value, the entire responsibility of determination of value including other circumstances not covered under the aspect of transaction value has come on the shoulders of the Superintendents of Central Excise.

3. To undertake preventive patrolling for exercising control over the assessees and to prevent clandestine removal of excisable goods even in remote and inaccessible regions.

4. Examination of accounts and physical verification of stocks to prevent leakage of revenue and misuse of concession and exemption.

5. Conducting search, effecting seizure and arresting offenders.

6. Verification in connection with Registration of assessee. Especially, the recent system of post verification has become very important.

7. Verification of the credit taken on the duty paid on inputs, capital goods and input services under CENVAT scheme and issuing of certificates to the manufacturers and provider of taxable services to facilitate taking of credit {Explanation appended to Rule 9 (3) of the CENVAT Rules, 2004}.

8. Remission of Central Excise duty not exceeding one thousand rupees where the goods have been lost or destroyed by natural cause or by unavoidable accident or being unfit for consumption & marketing before removal.

9. Recommendations for grant of refunds.

10. Detection of offence, drafting of show cause notice after investigation and full assistance in adjudication of offence cases alongwith preparing the adjudication orders for higher authorities.

11. Scrutiny of orders to see their legality and propriety.

12. Defend cases before Commissioner (Appeal) on behalf of the department.

13. Verification of production and checking of documents from the entry of raw materials upto its clearance as finished goods.

14. Scrutiny of ER-l and ER-3 returns.

15. Survey work to bring the manufacturers of excisable goods to Central Excise control.

16. Collection and compilation of Statistical data, preparation of various reports & returns to study the trend of revenue and follow up the reasons of fall of revenue.

17. Enquiry & investigation and collection & dissemination of intelligence.

18. Public and trade relations with special thrust on trade & factory management and rendering assistance from the recently introduced Help Centers.

19. Examination & supervision of sealing of packages of goods, cleared for Export particularly in DEEC Export, DFRC & Advance Authorisation Scheme including Export to SEZ as envisaged in Foreign Trade Policy.

20. Recovery of arrears of revenue and other Government dues by attachment and sale of goods/property.

21. Supervision of work done by the Inspectors.

22. All other works relating to Central Excise Act, 1944 and Central Excise Rules, 2002 and other Central Excise, Customs & Service Tax Rules.

23. Knowledge & implementation of various provisions of the different Acts, Rules and policies including as under-

i) The Central Excise Act, 1944.

ii) The Customs Act, 1962.

iii) The Factories Act, 1948.

iv) The Medical and Toilet Preparation (Excise Duty) Act.

v) The Companies Act, 1956.

vi) The General Clauses Act, 1897.

vii) The Khadi and other Handloom Industries development (Additional Excise duty on Cloth) Act, 1953.

viii) The Textile Committee Act, 1963.

ix) The Additional duties of Excise (Goods of Special Importance) Act,1957.

x) All Cess Acts.

xi) The provisions of levy and collection of Service Tax introduced through Finance Act, 1994.

xii) The Indian Contract Act.

xiii) The Sale of Goods Act.

xiv) Foreign Trade Policy.

xv) Foreign Trade (Development & Regulation) Act, 1992.

xvi) SEZ Act, 2005 & subordinate Rules & Regulations.

xvii) Foreign Exchange Management Act & Regulations.

xviii) Indian Evidence Act.

xix) Code of Criminal Procedure.

xx) Indian Penal Act.

xxi) The Central Excise Tariff Act, 1985.

xxii) The Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Policies Act, 1969.

xxiii) The Additional Duties Excise (Goods of Special Importance) Act, 1957.

xxiv) The Service Taxe provisions introduced through the Finance Act, 1994.

xxv) The Finance Act, 1964.

xxvi) The Import and Export Trade Control Act.

xxvii) The Foreign Exchange Regulation Act (FEMA).

xxviii) The Conservation of Foreign Exchange and Prevention of Smuggling Act (COFEPOSA).

xxix) The Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.

xxx) The Merchant Shipping Act.

xxxi) The Indian Petroleum Act.

xxxii) The Indian Tariff Act.

xxxiii) The Arms Act.

xxxiv) The Opium Act.

xxxv) The Destructive Pests and Insects Act.

xxxvi) The Antiquities Export (Control) Act.

xxxvii) The Merchandise Mark Act.

xxxviii) The Customs Tariff Act.

xxxix) All Finance Acts etc. etc.

(B) DUTY & NATURE OF JOB PERFORMED BY THE SUPERINTENDENT DURING HIS TENURE IN CUSTOMS FORMATIONS

The posting in Customs formation may be categorized as the following-

i) Posting in Land Customs station including the remotest of the remote places.

ii) Posting in Inland Container Depots (ICDs).

iii) Posting at airports and sea ports.

iv) Posting in Preventive Unit

v) Posting in Divisional/Hqrs. offices.

vi) Posting at SEZs.

2. Posting in Land Customs Station can be further classified into two categories-

i) Land Customs Station at Border Point, e.g., Nathula Pass, Rothang Pass etc.

ii) Land Customs Station away from the Border, i.e., Ranaghat, T.T. Shed etc.

3. Nature of job & functions against Sl. No. (i) to (iii) above: The job of the Superintendent can be broadly classified into three (3) categories-

a) Assessment- In the layman language, assessment means a process wherein the Superintendent decides if the data & value provided in the bill of export or import is correct or not. This is a quasi judicial function of the Superintendent. In cases of exports under some benefit scheme, the Superintendent is responsible to decide the exactitude of the benefit claimed by the exporter. This judgment needs not only the knowledge of the Customs Act but also he/she is to keep in mind export/import policy and Central Excise Act in addition to all the relevant Acts and procedures. It may so happen that the particular export or import is in order in view of the Customs Act, Central Excise Act, Exim Policy but banned by Drugs & Cosmetic Act or any other Act/law with which the Superintendent does not have any day to day connection. The assessment of import duty and decision about the importability/exportability of a product is also taken by the Superintendent. Any dispute between exporter/importer and the Department has to go through the process of natural justice. This involves issuance of Show Cause Notice and decision thereof which is never possible without the pivotal role of the Superintendent.

b) Cargo Clearance- Unlike Central Excise, the exercise of import/export clearance is totally a process of physical clearance. The Superintendent is responsible for matching the description of goods with the description provided in the Bill of export/ Bill of entry, the counting/weighment of the goods and to verify the importability/exportability of the goods alongwith other data/details.

c) Verification of post export benefit document - A number of post export benefits are allowed by the Government like DEPB, Drawback etc. The Superintendent is required to verify and certify the genuineness of export. It is found as per the present trend that there is bulk of export under different export benefit schemes issued by the Ministry of Commerce. The Superintendent is required to verify each of the export document in effect which means each of such document is required to be verified twice.

d) The Central Excise benefits connected with the export are also required to be verified from export point of view before allowing the benefit.

4. Nature of job & functions at preventive unit-

i) Collection of intelligence and information.

ii) Working out of the same.

iii) Regular Preventive work.

iv) Documentation of the work.

v) Preparation and issuance of Show Cause Notices.

vi) Preparation of Adjudication Orders on behalf of Commissioner and other authorities.

vii) Receiving the seized goods from BSF.

viii) Preparation of Annexure - I (valuation of seized/confiscated goods)

ix) Disposal of seized/confiscated goods.

x) Auction of livestock, perishable and non- perishable items.

xi) Preparation of reports/returns.

xii) Court matters etc. etc.

5. At the time of posting at Divisional/Hqrs. Offices, the Superintendent does various works relating to adjudication, review, administration, statistics, recovery, audit, appeal, systems, valuation etc. He also looks after the work of legal and technical nature alongwith various other miscellaneous works.

6. Function of the Superintendent posted in SEZ: The Superintendent of Central Excise is one of the officers who is an Authorized Officer as defined in Rule 2(c) of the SEZ Rules, 2005 and is required to discharge the duties of an Authorized Officer and also to discharge the functions of Specified Officer on authorization. The responsibilities can be estimated from the statement of the Finance Ministry saying that the benefits of tax exemption is going to be availed by the units in SEZ amounting to Rs. 1 lakh crore (upto 2010). The Authorized Officer is responsible to check any misuse and discharge the following duties-

i). Assessment of Shipping Bills, Bill of Entry and DTA Bill of Entries.

ii). Verification of goods procured from DTA and imported before use;

iii). Allowing admission into SEZ to the goods procured under claim of export entitlement on the basis of ARE-1 and Bill of Export filed by the supplier which is assessed by the Authorized Officer;

iv). Endorsement of ARE-1 and/or Bill of Export on admission of goods which is the proof of export;

v). Allowing of clearance of the goods from the warehouse on the cover of ex-bond Shipping Bill and on the basis of Bill of Entry duly assessed by the Authorized Officer;

vi). Presence of Authorized Officer in destruction of goods outside SEZ ;

vii). Permission to a unit to transfer goods to an EOU or EHTPU or STPU or BPU or to a bonded warehouse without payment of duty subject to conditions;

viii). Receipt of an undertaking for return of goods transferred for quality testing or research and development purpose;

ix). Making entries of all incoming and outgoing goods/consignments in register;

x). Checking of marks and numbers of all imported goods/consignments;

xi). Work related to export incentives;

xii). Allowing of goods from DTA after verification;

xiii). Escort duty, if required;

xiv). Attending legal work;

xv). Preparation of show cause notice after investigation;

xvi). Preparation of report and return;

xvii). Special checking of consignments exported under self-sealing, if needed.

(C) FUNCTIONS OF THE SUPERINTENDENTS POSTED IN SERVICE TAX

i) Survey to locate provider of taxable service.

ii) Registration of Service Tax assessees.

iii) Receive the statutory Returns and scrutinize after calling the records & classifying the taxable service.

iv) Full responsibility of the Superintendent to verify the credit taken on the duty paid on inputs, capital goods and input services under CENVAT scheme and issuing of certificates to the manufacturers and provider of taxable services for taking of CENVAT credit. {Explanation appended to Rule 9 (3) of the Cenvat Rules, 2004.}

v) Detection and investigation of taxable service on which tax not paid.

vii) Issuance of Show Cause Notices and comments on the reply of the Show Cause Notices.

viii) Preparation of Adjudication Orders on behalf of Commissioner and other authorities.

ix) Scrutiny of the adjudication orders to see their legality and propriety.

x) Adjudication of cases as quasijudicial authority.

xi) Recommendation for grant of refund including rebate/drawback after verification of export of taxable service.

xii) Attachment of property prior to adjudication.

xiii) Full assistance for attachment/sale to recover arrears and also to realize the government dues from any organization from which the money is due.

xix) Court matters.

xx) Knowledge and implementation of different Acts and Rules made thereunder related to taxable services including as under-

a. Insurance Act,1938;

b. Aircraft Act,1934;

c. Airports Authority of India Act,1994;

d. Customs Act,1962;

e. Architects Act,1972;

f. Foreign Exchange Management Act,1999;

g. Reserve Bank Act,1934;

h. Banking Regulation Act,1949;

i. Central Boards of Revenue Act,1963;

j. Companies Act,1956;

k. Prasar Bharti (Broad-casting Corporation of India) Act,1990;

1. Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act, 1995;

m. Information Technology Act, 2000;

n. Forward Contracts (Regulation) Act,1952;

o. General Insurance Business (Nationalisation) Act,1972;

p. Sale of Goods Act,1930;

q. Motor Vehicles Act,1988;

r. Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority Act,1999;

s. Transfer of Property Act,1882;

t. Indian Ports Act,1908;

u. Major Port Trusts Act,1963;

v. Chartered Accountants Act,1949;

w. Cost and Works Accountants Act,1959;

x. Company Secretaries Act,1980;

y. Securities Contract (Regulation) Act,1956;

z. Securities and Exchange Board of India Act,1992;

aa. Indian Telegraph Act, 1985 etc. etc.

It deserves special mention that other agencies work only with specific laws, whereas the Central Excise Superintendents are required to have a fair understanding and have to work with the various laws.

PART-III

APPEAL FOR REMOVAL OF EXTRAOERDINARILY ACUTE STAGNATION EXISTING IN THE CADRE OF CENTRAL EXCISE SUPERINTENDENT

Central Excise Superintendents are retiring in PB2 after getting only one promotion in the service career of 35-40 years after joining the job as Inspector while their common entry counterparts of CBDT, CSS etc. easily enter & enjoy PB4 levels after getting 5-6 promotions. They are getting promotion (if any) merely to Junior Time Scale while other counterparts of CPWD, Railway Board, AFHQ, Foreign Services, CSS, Administrative Services, Police Services, Forest Services, Sate Services etc. to Senior Time Scale. They are also forced to work under the extreme juniors of Customs belonging to the same cadre under the same organisation of CBEC in same Department of Revenue of same Ministry of Finance having same administrative hierarchy and recruited by same process. The rights to grow, make progress and live with dignity have been snatched from the Central Excise Superintendents.

2. The causation of frustration of any cadre in any organization is due to the stagnation. The cadre of Superintendent of Central Excise is facing the extraordinarily acute stagnation and worst career prospects in the Govt. of India. They are retiring on a PB2 post with only single promotion in the career of 35-40 years after being joined the job as Inspector whereas their counterparts of CSS, CBDT, Rajya Sabha Secretariat etc. are easily entering into PB4 after getting 5 to 6 promotions. Only 1% Superintendents of Central Excise are able to enter into JTS level of Group ‘A’ at the fag end of the career after joining the job as Inspector. They are even forced to work under extreme juniors of Customs recruited as Examiner through same examination with same eligibility conditions belonging to same cadre of Inspector in the same organisation of CBEC performing same nature of duties with same administrative hierarchy under same department of Revenue of same Ministry of Finance merged at JTS Group ‘A’ entry level. Some reasons for their stagnation are as below-

i) The Cadre review exercise have not been conducted at prescribed intervals of every five years in CBEC required to be conducted in accordance with IV CPC & V CPC recommendations and DOPT OM No. 2/1/87-PP dated 23.11.1987. Only two cadre restructurings have happened in the history of the CBEC, the implementation of one of which is still pending despite of its process being started in 2006.

ii) Adopting of ratio system for three categories of Group ‘B’ gazetted officers of same organisation to enter into Group ‘A’ despite of the DOPT guidelines not mandating any ratio formula to enter Group ‘A’, if the number of promotional posts is too less. In our case, the number of the promotional posts is even less than 2% in r/o Central Excise feeder category.

iii) Framing of faulty & discriminatory Recruitment Rules as well as promotion policy by CBEC.

iv) No in-situ promotions scheme or time bound promotions scheme or flexible complimenting scheme or fast track promotions scheme etc. for the post of Superintendent/Inspector of Central Excise.

v) Modified ACP Scheme has also provided no relief being proved lossful instead of beneficial as compared to ACP Scheme. MACPS is able to grant the Grade Pay/pay scale to our officers after 30 years or more service which they were able to get within 24 years under ACPS. Whereas the MACPS source being the same (VIth CPC), our counterparts are able to get two financial upgradations more than us merely within 26 years of service in the State governments of Uttar Pradesh etc. without offsetting any MACP upgradtion with the time scale.

vi) No scheme to grant even time scales under regular time intervals.

vii) Existence of Inter category/intra-cadre disparities in promotions.

viii) A few Cadre Restructurings were conducted by CBEC which were not on the basis of functional cum structural considerations with due regard to the duties and need to promote efficiency in the organisation/department and also not in accordance with the guidelines prescribed by DOPT. These were conducted merely to give maximum benefits to the Group ‘A’ officers.

ix) No scheme to grant parity, functional or non-functional, with the best placed counterparts.

3. The 5^th Central Pay Commission in its report vide para 66.117 has interalia observed that “the activities of the CBEC are covered under the Non-Plan Budget of the Department of Revenue, which has reportedly caused a situation where legitimate needs for expansion of the department are not taken care of. It has been demanded in this context that a relationship between revenue collected and expenditure on revenue services should be established so that need for additional staff for the department is properly taken care of. We have considered this demand and feel that augmentation of the manpower resources of the department should be strictly determined only on functional considerations and there can be no nexus between expenditure on establishment and revenue collections”. These observations were totally ignored by the CBEC.

4. The Tax Reforms Committee headed by Dr. Raja Chelliah has categorically mentioned in para 10.2 of Page 126 of Interim Report that the Government should recognize the paramount importance of the Revenue Department and should spare no efforts in improving their conditions of service, technical skills and work environment. In para 10.3 interealia it is also mentioned that taking into account the vital role that the Revenue Department should play in garnering adequate resources for ensuring the security of the country as well as substantial economic growth with social justice, the committee is firmly of the view that the salary scales and promotional prospects of the officers and staffs in the revenue department should at least be comparable with the best that Government offers to its employee. But very unfortunately, no consideration has been given to the above recommendations of this committee also.

5. The 4^th Central Pay Commission in its report vide para 23.9 and 23.10 (Chapter 23) has interalia observed that “It appears that introduction of Selection grade and grant of one stagnation increment have proved to be temporary palliatives. A solution of the problems of stagnation and inadequate promotion opportunities should seem to be in a rational cadre structure and long pay scales. It is recognized that promotional opportunities should be available to employees as motivation for them to contribute their best in the discharge of their duties. At the same time, the system of career progression should be consistent with the functional needs and requirements of organization. It may not, therefore, be feasible to lay down a rigid formulation as to the number of promotions which an employee should have in his career and the length of service which should qualify for such time bound promotions.” Vide DOPT OM No. 2/1/87-PP dt.23.11.87 circulated under MF(DR) F.No.12/217/87-coord dated 21.12.87 (Cir. 317/87), the guidelines for cadre review of Group B, C and D cadres in the light of the recommendations made by the 4^th Central Pay Commission were issued by the Central Govt. In the said circular, it is inter alia mentioned that “periodical Cadre Review is an important part of personnel management in the organization. It plays a vital role in the smooth functioning of the cadre and in keeping up the moral of its members. The main thrust of the cadre review should be on manpower projections and recruitment planning on scientific lines aiming at the same time at rationalization of the existing cadre structure with a view to improve the efficiency, moral and effectiveness of the cadre”. It is also stipulated in the said circular that the cadre review exercise should be conducted after every five years.

6. On the basis of 4^th Central Pay Commission recommendations for periodical cadre review with a view to ensuring reasonable career progression to the employees and operational efficiency through comprehensive manpower planning, most of the Central Government Departments conducted cadre review in the year 1987 whereas Union Finance Ministry under letter dated 25.07.1989 (MF-DR-F.No.A-11013/4/89-Ad.IV) conveyed the sanction of the posts in the cadre review of Indian Customs and Central Excise Group ‘A’ posts by increasing the posts of IC&CES(Group A) from 1278 to 1718 without providing any promotional avenues to Group ‘B’ Gazetted officers. These Group ‘A’ posts were also not increased in proportion to Group ‘B’ cadre strength.

7. The Central Government under DOPT O.M.No.2/1/87-PP dated 23.11.87 issued order for periodical Cadre Review of various staff cadres at an interval of 5 years and in accordance with such instructions, it was required on the part of the CBEC to make Cadre Review at an interval of 5 years in the following block years.

a. Ist Cadre Review upto 1986.

b. IInd Cadre Review for 1987-91.

c. IIIrd Cadre Review for 1992-96.

d. IVth Cadre Review for 1997-2001.

e. Vth Cadre Review for 2002-2006.

f. VIth Cadre Review for 2007-2011.

g. VIIth Cadre Review for 2011-2015.

8. A proposal of the Customs and Central Excise Department for the up-gradation of 2357 posts of Inspectors of Central Excise/Preventive Officers to Superintendents of Central Excise/Superintendent (Preventive) of Customs was been approved by the Hon’ble Finance Minister in July 1996. This consisted of 1757 posts of Inspector and 600 posts of Preventive Officers. Vide F. No. A-11012/1/96-Ad.IV Dated:18.06.1997, it is interalia mentioned that “while approving the proposal, it was stipulated that the upgradation shall be carried out in a phased manner, the officers with 17 years of regular service to be promoted in the first phase within a year and the officers completing 16 years of regular service to be promoted in the second phase. But the Group ‘A’ posts were not increased in the proportion of the increase of Group ‘B’ posts/Span Control etc.

9. During 1998, the CBEC has decided that “the Excise administration in particular relating to Audit, Preventive, Service Tax, Ranges and certain other areas is required to be urgently re-enforced and re-structured by providing higher level officers with enhanced expertise at different levels as a part of the overall objective of bringing improvement in the efficiency of the organisation and morale of the employees”.

10. Accordingly a proposal of Cadre Restructuring submitted by CBEC was accepted by Revenue Secretary on 03.11.1998 which interalia provided for (a) up-gradation of 3387 post of Superintendent (b) creation of 236 posts of Senior Superintendents (c) up-gradation of 700 posts of Superintendent of Customs (Preventive) and (d) up-gradation of 350 posts of Appraisers. In accordance with the said restructuring proposal, it was suggested for up-gradation/creation of 4673 senior level posts. This up-gradation should have been on similar lines of cadre restructuring approved for CBDT to restore parity with Income Tax Department.

11. However without approving the up-gradation/creation of 4673 senior level posts, CBEC reportedly submitted a proposal of Cadre Restructuring which was subsequently approved by the Central Government vide Cabinet Secretariat note No.28/CM/2001(i) dated 16.07.2001 totally ignoring the legitimate claims of the Superintendents of Central Excise (Group ‘B’ gazetted) as a whole with an intention to provide more benefits only to the officials of IRS (Customs & Central Excise) Group ‘A’ service in CBEC. This cadre restructuring was not conducted on functional-cum-structural considerations with due regard to the duties as needed to promote efficiency in the organisation/department but was conducted only to give parity to the IRS of CBEC with the IRS of CBDT.

12. In accordance of the F. No. A-11019/72/99-Ad.IV Dated: 19.07.2001 the sanction strength of IRS (Group ‘A’), Group ‘B’ Executive and Group ‘C’ Executive of CBEC was as under during 2001:

Chief Commissioner : 47

Commissioner : 290

Addl. Commissioner : 300

Joint Commissioner : 276

Deputy Commissioner : 701

Asst. Commissioner : 690

Total Group-A : 2304

Total Group-B Executive: 12766

Total Group-C Executive: 18053

13. The restructuring was done in such a manner that Group-A direct recruits were promised five pay scales and five promotions after the entry level excluding the level of Member & Chairman of the Board. The Group-B gazetted Executive Officers who enter the service as Group-B non-gazetted registered an increase of 61 percent. However, the promotional avenues from Group-B to Group-A was drastically reduced because only 345 (50% if 690) promotional posts were available for 12766 Group-B gazetted executive officers for their 2^nd promotion which worked out to merely 2.7% and only around 1% of total strength of Group ‘B’ Gazetted as well as Non-Gazetted executive officers of Central Excise while the promotional avenues to Group-A officers ranged from 55% to 129%.

14. In the Cadre Restructuring - 2013 of CBEC (notified on 18.12-2013), 689 senior level posts (Principal Chief Commissioner to Deputy Commissioner) have been created whereas only 300 posts (regular) have been created at Group ‘A’ entry level, i.e., Asst. Commissioner in JTS crade. Total consequential vacancies at the level of Asst. Commissioner (regular) will be 989 (689 + 300) which are proposed to be filled-up @ 50% by promotion and 50% by Direct Recruitment in accordance with the Recruitment Rules. In effect, majority of these posts are going to remain unfilled for next three to twelve years. Particularly, in the Financial Years of 2013-14 and 2014-15, only 484 vacancies are likely to be filled by way of promotions as the corresponding 485 DR vacancies will actually be available only within 12 years as recruitment process of UPSC cannot commence before Feb, 2015.

15. Moreover, the CBEC is already behind the model calendar of DPC for the post of Asst. Commissioner by 2 years resulting in the retirement of the officers due for promotion. Further as on date, there are around 250 vacant posts of Asst. Commissioner on direct quota and during next 10 years, around 1000 of regular posts (approximately 100 every year) will be lying vacant. For effective cadre management and as per UPSC norms, the ideal DR (direct recruit) quota shall be around 150 per year and UPSC will not be inclined to recruit more. Hence, approximately 12 years will be required to fill up all such posts (250+485+1000=1735). Accordingly, a good number of Asst. Commissioner posts will remain vacant for next 12 years.

16. As per DOPT OM No. No. I-11011/1/2009-CRD dated 14-12-210, “The Cadre Controlling Authorities are, however, advised not to resort to any bulk recruitment as it would create a bulge in the structure leading to stagnation at later stage. This may be kept in view while projecting recruitment planning.” It is surprising to note that CBEC lost sight of such important advice of DOPT. Keeping a large number of posts vacant in the grade of Asst. Commissioner for a period of 12 years is bound to adversely affect the revenue collections. Besides, it will increase the size of the bottlebase beneath the bottleneck directly affecting promotional prospects of Group-B Gazetted officers.

17. Stagnation level in the grade of Superintendent of Central Excise is presently nearly 20 years. It will be increased to 24 years in the coming years. It is also worth to submit that the present stagnation is also around 20 years as an average at the level of Central Excise Inspector. Even the Inspectors with 25 years of service are waiting for promotion. Thus, the present scheme of filling-up of 989 posts of Asst. Commissioner in the ratio of 50% by promotion and 50% by direct recruitment will have demoralizing effect on the officers at the cutting edge level of Central Excise Group-B Gazetted. If such a large number of posts are kept vacant, it is not understood how the promised growth in revenue collections in the coming years will be achieved.

18. We are sure that these intricacies have not been duly highlighted in the proposal of cadre restructuring submitted by the CBEC. Here, it is pertinent to mention that Cadre Restructuring is for those who are already in service & not for those who are in college and likely to join service in future or even not taken birth. In Cadre Restructuring-2002, it was inter alia clearly mentioned in the cabinet note that “it is alignment with the policy of Govt. which lays down the objective of cadre review as the achievement of congruence between functional needs of the department and legitimate aspirations of the staff.” Accordingly, cabinet approved the Cadre Restructuring-2002 for filling-up of vacancies of all newly created posts by promotion in one go and not through recruitment from open market. Therefore in the current cadre restructuring also, all vacancies should be filled-up by promotions only in one go including the cascading vacancies.

19. Further, the promotional prospects of Superintendents of Central Excise were adversely affected due to the fixation of 6:1:2 ratio in old Recruitment Rules giving undue benefit to one of the feeder categories namely Appraisers of Customs. However, the said ratio has been revised to 13:2:1but the adhoc promotions have not been regularised based on the new ratio, i.e., the rules existing on the date of regularisation. It is also pertinent to resubmit that no ratio system for promotion to Group ‘A’ is mandated in our case as per DOPT guidelines on account of the number of promotional posts being too less. Therefore, the promotions should be affected on the basis of length of service in Group B gazetted cadre instead of any ratio. By virtue of the undue benefit, the Appraisers of 2002 have already been promoted to the post of Asst. Commissioner whereas the Superintendents of 1993 are yet to be promoted.

20. The temporary posts of Asst. Commissioner have also been created for removal of stagnation in the grade of Superintendent of Central Excise as per our continuous demand, agitation and representations. All such temporary posts, at least, are required to be filled-up from the Central Excise Superintendent category only duly amending the recruitment rules without giving even a single post to the Appraisers. If Appraisers are allowed to be promoted against the temporary posts in 13.2.1 ratio, 2008 batch of Appraisers (including all Appraisers as on date) will be promoted whereas only 2001 batch Superintendents of Central Excise will become Asstt. Commissioner definitely increasing further the demoralizing effect on Central Excise Superintendents, who are instrumental to collect the Govt. revenue in all of three streams of indirect tax (i.e., Central Excise, Customs & Service Tax) instead of single stream of Customs like Appraisers.

21. The Inspector cadre has been trifurcated by the CBEC into three categories without any justification, i.e., Inspector of Central Excise, Preventive Officer of Customs and Examiner of Customs (all analogous posts) recruited through the same competitive examination under same eligibility conditions in the same organization of CBEC of the same Department of Revenue in the same Ministry of Finance having same administrative hierarchy and performing same nature of job of tax collection but with huge discriminatory difference in promotional avenues (admitted by CBEC). All of these are mentioned as “Inspector only” in the recruitment rules and other relevant documents getting next promotion as Superintendent of Central Excise, Superintendent of Customs and Appraiser of Customs (again all analogous posts) respectively at group ‘B’ gazetted level performing again same nature of job. The single cadre trifurcated at the level of Inspector is re-merged at the level of Asstt. Commissioner (JTS group ‘A’ entry level) placing Central Excise Inspectors decades behind the Examiners of Customs.

22. The Central Excise stream officers work in all of the three streams of the CBEC, i.e., Central Excise, Service Tax and Customs. On the other hand, the Customs stream officers work only in the Customs stream but they are posted to Central Excise and Service Tax after entry into group ‘A’. Thus, it is even more surprising that a junior officer having worked only in the Customs stream and having no knowledge of Central Excise or Service Tax heads his seniors of Central Excise and Service Tax. Such a horrible situation of humiliation and discrimination to work under an extreme junior happens only in the organization of CBEC which is neither justifiable by any rule of law or any principle of natural justice.

23. It is surprising to note as to how CBEC lost sight to recommend for removal of these intra-cadre disparities in promotions existing for decades. Since 2118 temporary posts of Asst. Commissioner have been created for 5 years with the provision of no further promotion to the holders of temporary post. Hence, creation of the temporary posts will neither undo the disparities in promotions nor solve the stagnation problem. As a result of the notification of the current cadre restructuring of CBEC, the sanctioned strength of Group-B Gazetted and Non-Gazetted executive officers has become 19108 and 25203 respectively having only 479 posts of regular Asst. Commissioner available for their promotion. Hence again, 99% of Group-B executive officers of Central Excise will retire without getting promotion to Group-A. In accordance to the DOPT guidelines issued on the basis of VI CPC recommendations, at least 7000 regular posts are required to be created at Group ‘A’ entry level on functional basis, but Govt. created only 300 new posts. Our officers are now forced to opt for the opportunities outside and leaving the department due to being faced the worst career prospects and inadequate pay scales. Thus, the productivity in the department is affected negatively through the cumulative ordeal of desperations and country continues to suffer in respect of revenue adversely.

24. The following table shows the comparative promotion status for analogous posts in the Revenue Department recruited through the same examination as the ‘worst case scenario’-

Name of the Cadre	Year of Joining	Year of 1^st Promotion	Year of 2^nd Promotion
Inspector of Central Excise	1975	1993	No 2^nd Promotion
Preventive Officer of Customs	1975	1996	2005
Examiner of Customs	1986	1994	2005
Inspector of Income Tax	1988	1995	2005

(It is well pertinent to submit that all other categories except Central Excise Inspectors/Superintendents are getting 4 to 6 functional promotions in their service career)

25. Everybody in the corridors of power of CBEC is worried only about the stature, interest & character of the IRS even for those officers who have not yet taken birth but nobody has any worry for the career prospects & job-satisfaction of the actual workforce (Central Excise Superintendents & Inspectors) already collecting the major portion of the government revenue. The DOPT Minister agreed to Sh. Punia, the Chairman of SC Commission, to consider the proposal devising specific measures to address the problem of stagnation of the Central Excise Superintendents & Inspectors, if referred to DOPT. It was expected that a proposal of parity with the best placed common entry counterparts would be mooted under consultation with the Association by the CBEC on the lines of parity being granted to group ‘A’ officers with their best placed counterparts. But very unfortunately, no step has been taken till date on the issue for our officers. This shows the mind set-up of our IRS authorities to keep our officers retiring after single promotion by not allowing them even to enter the junior group ‘A’ whereas IRS officers have been ensured upto 9 promotions in the latest cadre restructuring by creating the posts at Apex, HAG+ etc. levels in higher scales even without availability of the eligible officers and also without any functional requirement. Thus, the following measures may kindly be taken for the Central Excise Superintendents to improve the career prospects of these poor officers-

(1) FRAMING OF RECRUITMENT RULES TO CREATE SEPARATE SERVICE:

As per DOPT Handbook on Recruitment Rules, the Recruitment Rules (RRs) should be reviewed once in 5 years vide para 3.1.5 with a view to affect such changes as are necessary to bring them in conformity with the changed position including additions to or reductions in the strength of the lower and higher level posts but CBEC never implemented such instructions of DOPT. The Group-A RRs framed during 1987 were revised during 2012 instead of every 5 years.

2. Having been grossly aggrieved after grave suffering for thousands of silent, frustrated, depressed, disappointed, humiliated, demoralised and anguished Superintendents of Central Excise, we would like to express the disillusionment and heartburn of such a large number of officers due to the malaise prevailing in their hearts affecting their morale and work culture. The main cause of this state of deterioration is that the Superintendents of Central Excise are getting just one promotion in their entire service span of about 35 to 40 years after joining the job as Inspector whereas other officers like Examiners of Customs having joined in the same service and selected through the same all India combined competitive examination on merit and option basis conducted by the selection body, i.e., Staff Selection Commission, are getting 4 to 5 promotions in the similar duration of service. More condemnable is the reason that the Central Excise Inspectors and Preventive Officers of Customs (General, Scheduled Castes & Scheduled Tribe all) are compelled to work under the Examiners of Customs even having lower merit or selected through a later examination (upto 20 years afterwards) despite of all Central Excise Inspectors, Preventive Officers of Customs and Examiners of Customs having been selected through the same all India combined competitive annual examination and appointed in the same service of same organisation in same Department under same Ministry to the same level of post (Promotions are made as mere simple promotion and not on selection basis or selection post but to the cadre posts at different levels in the same service). We have been fighting for justice as per Rule of Law and Constitution of India for the last over three decades with no tangible results so far due to the malafide acts of commissions & omissions by the concerned officials. The right to live with dignity & respect has been snatched from us.

3. Hon'ble Apex court in the case of Radhey Shyam Singh upheld that "Direct Recruitment" made on the basis of "Zonal Examination" conducted by SSC is contrary to Fundamental Rights. Thereby, it was struck down and the examination on all India basis started since 1996 as per the directions of the Hon’ble Apex Court. In the year 1999, the then Director/Commissioner of DOPM made a self speaking elaborate noting in the concerned file that it is unfair & unjust and also unconstitutional to have separate cadres of (a) Inspector of Central Excise (b) Preventive Officer of Customs &( c) Examiner of Customs and also of (d)Superintendent of Central Excise (e) Superintendent of Customs Preventive and ( f) Appraiser of Customs in the same service and should be merged in one single cadre at each such level (just like in Income Tax). Subsequently after his transfer however, no efforts were made though shown to have been made (with dilatory tactics, pre-planned motives & conclusions) without any tangible, legal and justified results by the CBEC as obvious from the factual position submitted under forthcoming paras:

Present Hierarchy of executive Posts in CBEC:

Level (I) Group ‘B’ – Non Gazzetted

(i) Inspector (Central Excise).

(ii) Inspector (Preventive Officer of Customs).

(iii) Inspector (Examiner of Customs).

All recruited through one and same process.

Level (II) Group ‘B’ Gazzetted

(i) Superintendent of Central Excise

(ii) Superintendent of Customs

(iii) Appraiser of Customs

Respective promotional post for the Level (I) posts.

Level (III) Group ‘A’ entry JTS

Asstt. Commissioner of Central Excise, Customs & Service Tax.

Single promotional post for all Level (II) posts (filled-up based on ratio formula against DOPT provisions because number of promotional posts is too less).

Level (IV) Group ‘A’ STS

Deputy Commissioner of Central Excise, Customs & Service Tax.

Time scale promotional post for Group ‘A’ Asstt. Commissioner.

Level (V) Group ‘A’

Joint Commissioner of Central Excise, Customs & Service Tax.

Promotional post for Group ‘A’ Deputy Commissioner.

Level (VI) Group ‘A’

Addl. Commissioner of Central Excise, Customs & Service Tax.

Time scale promotional post for Group ‘A’ Joint Commissioner.

Level (VII) Group ‘A’

Commissioner of Central Excise, Customs & Service Tax.

Promotional post for Group ‘A’ Addl. Commissioner.

Level (VIII) Group ‘A’

Chief Commissioner of Central Excise, Customs & Service Tax.

Promotional post for Group ‘A’ Commissioner.

Level (IX) Group ‘A’

Member of CBEC-Promotional post for Group ‘A’ Chief Commissioner.

Level (X) Group ‘A’

Chairman of CBEC-Promotional post for Member of CBEC.

4. Two more levels with new pay scales have been created between Level (VIII) and Level (IX) for Group ‘A’ officers in the current cadre restructuring.

5. The rule in conformity with the Law as well as Constitution of India is that any person lower in rank & merit and selected through the same all India combined competitive examination conducted on the basis of same qualification for the same level posts and having been appointed in the same organisation/service can never become superior to the other officer higher in rank & merit and selected through the same all India combined competitive examination for same service in the same organisation. But the situation in the CBEC is very astounding as the Inspectors of Central Excise of 1975 batch have yet not been promoted to Group-A while the Preventive Officers of 1984 batch and Examiners of 1994 batch have already been promoted to Group-A. Also the Examiners of 1984 batch are at present Joint Commissioner whereas the 1975 batch Inspectors of Central Excise are still Superintendent. Thus by the wrong acts of the concerned authorities, the Superintendents/Inspectors of Central Excise are forced to work under the junior officers recruited as Examiner.

6. The position of stagnation in the Superintendents of Central Excise is so horrible that 99% of these officers are forced to retire with one promotion only in the service career of 35-40 years after joining as Inspector while their common entry counterparts are getting 5/6 promotions attaining the level of Joint Secretary. The most of the group ‘B’ gazetted officers in the Central as well as State governments are promoted to a Senior Time Scale post while Central Excise Superintendents are promoted (if any) merely to a Junior Time Scale post and they are also forced to work under their extreme juniors of Customs belonging to same cadre recruited through same examination in CBEC under same Department of Revenue and same Ministry of Finance. It is requested that the Recruitment Rules should be framed without trifurcating the single cadre at Inspector as well as Superintendent level prescribing the qualifying services as below in strict consonance of OM No. AB-14017/61/2008-Estt.(RR) dt. 24.03.09 of DOPT (not being followed by CBEC) which stipulates the promotion of Inspector completing 12, 17 & 20 years of service to the grade of Joint Commissioner, Additional Commissioner & Commissioner respectively. The validity of this OM was also admitted by CBEC during the presentation of cadre restructuring proposal on 18.01.11. No need also to submit that the said qualifying services/residency periods have been prescribed by the DOPT with the due diligence and application of mind. As per the said OM, the residency periods are prescribed as under-

(i) 2 years for promotion to a post with a grade pay of Rs. 4,800/- after joining as Inspector.

(ii) 7 years for promotion to a post with a grade pay of Rs. 6,600/- after joining as Inspector (There is no justification of promoting an officer from a grade pay of Rs. 5,400/- to 5,400/-. It is also submit-worthy that the most of the group ‘B’ gazetted officers including CSS are being promoted to a senior group ‘A’ post instead of junior group ‘A’ in Central as well as State governments.).

(iii) 12 years for promotion to a post with a grade pay of Rs. 7,600/- after joining as Inspector.

(iv) 17 years for promotion to a post with a grade pay of Rs. 8,700/- after joining as Inspector.

(v) 20 years for promotion to a post with a grade pay of Rs. 10,000/- after joining as Inspector.

(vi) and so on.

7. Keeping in view the extraordinarily acute stagnation of the Central Excise executive officers, it is also required to incorporate a permanent provision in the RRs at every level framed on the above lines in addition to the above qualifying services/residency periods to promote (even in-situ or otherwise) the officer automatically to the next higher grade, if his/her stagnation in a grade reaches 1½ times of qualifying service.

8. It is also submitted that the common entry counterparts of the Superintendents of Central Excise are easily reaching PB4 levels (Addl. Commissioner/Commissioner & Director/Joint Secretary) getting 5/6 promotions. 1994 Examiners as well as Inspectors of Income Tax have long back entered group ‘A’ and 1997 Assistants have long back entered into senior group ‘A’ while our Inspector of 1975 is still waiting even to enter the junior group ‘A’. 1985 Assistant of Rajya Sabha Secretariat has long back been promoted to the post of Director. The parity with the other better placed counterparts to our officers is the need of the time in the interest of the Govt. revenue and is very well possible by framing the RRs in the manner as submitted in the preceding para or by adopting the measures like time bound promotions/scales (grant of time scale to our officers after every 7 years was also recommended by CBEC to 6^th CPC), separate service, notional promotions, supernumerary posts, in-situ promotions etc. The promotional avenues available to counterparts of other departments vis-a-vis the officers joining the job as Inspector of Central Excise are furnished as below:

1. PROMOTIONAL AVENUES OF INSPECTOR OF CENTRAL EXCISE

(1) Inspector

(2) Superintendent

(3) Asstt. Commissioner-JTS (only around 1%)

{ONLY ONE PROMOTION barring 1%}

2. PROMOTIONAL AVENUES OF EXAMINER OF CUSTOMS

(1) Examiner

(2) Appraiser

(3) Asstt. Commissioner

(4) Deputy Commissioner

(5) Joint Commissioner

(6) Addl. Commissioner

{5 PROMOTIONS}

3. PROMOTIONAL AVENUES OF INSPECTOR OF INCOME TAX

(1) Inspector

(2) Income Tax Officer

(3) Asstt. Commissioner

(4) Deputy Commissioner

(5) Joint Commissioner

(6) Addl. Commissioner

(7) Commissioner

{6 PROMOTIONS}

PROMOTIONAL AVENUES OF ASSISTANT OF CSS

(1) Assistant

(2) Section Officer

(3) Under Secretary (STS-equivalent to 2 promotions)

(4) Deputy Secretary

(5) Director

(6) Joint Secretary

{EQUIVALENT TO 6 PROMOTIONS}

PROMOTIONAL AVENUES OF ASSISTANT OF RAJYA SABHA SECRETARIAT

(1) Assistant

(2) Section Officer

(3) Under Secretary (STS-equivalent to 2 promotions)

(4) Deputy Secretary

(5) Director

(6) Joint Secretary

{EQUIVALENT TO 6 PROMOTIONS}

9. During the year 1978, Appraisers of Customs (A. K. Chatterjee and others) filed a writ petition before the Apex Court for the reason that some of their counterparts from Central Excise (Superintendents of Central Excise) junior to them by 1 or 1½ half years in the service have been promoted ahead of them. They wanted that Recruitment Rules should be framed & promotions should be done on the basis of length of service in the feeder cadre. As per the directions of Apex Court, Govt. framed Indian Customs and Central Excise (Group-A) Recruitment Rules in 1987 based on length of service in the feeder cadre (i.e., to allow promotions to the post of Asstt. Commissioner based on a common seniority list on the basis of length of service of the officers belonging to three feeder categories). This was challenged by the then office bearers of AIFCEGEO (now AIACEGEO) & AIFCEEO (now AICEIA) in the Supreme Court jointly under WP(C) No. 306/1988. While the matter was pending in the Supreme Court for decision, the CBEC made a deceptive proposal dt. 08.10.1988 in total disregard of the facts by distributing the posts within the Customs and Central Excise on the basis of the number of Custom Service posts and Central Excise Service posts of Asstt. Commissioner at group A entry level. Whereas the fact is that the Customs Service Group ‘A’ and Central Excise Service Group ‘A’ were merged w.e.f. 15^th August, 1959 into a single service of Customs and Central Excise Service Group ‘A’. The Apex Court vide WP No 306/1988 without any judicial determination accepted the proposal of CBEC of 6:1:2 ratio for promotion to Group-A to amend the Group-A RRs in 1998.

10. The Superintendents of Customs Preventive filed O.A. No. 489/1999 in Bombay CAT. The CAT directed in July, 2001 to consider the grievances of the Superintendents of Customs. Against this decision of CAT, the Appraisers of Customs filed Appeal before the High Court of Bombay. The Bombay High Court said that Bombay CAT didn’t have any jurisdiction of passing the orders of July, 2001. Superintendents of Customs filed an Appeal against the orders of the Bombay High Court in the Supreme Court of India. WP(C) No. 385/2010 was also filed by AIACEGEO (through Shri Vimal Kumar) in the Apex Court. The Supreme Court delivered the following judgment by consensus in the Writ Petition (Civil) No. 385 of 2010:-

“We have heard learned counsels for the parties in Civil Appeal No. 1198 of 2005 and Writ Petition (Civil) No. 385 of 2010.

It has been brought to our notice that the Union of India in terms of our previous order/directions dated 22nd November, 2010 and 06^th December, 2010, has filed an affidavit in Civil Appeal No. 1198 of 2005, inter alia, stating, that it has initiated the process of reviewing the Recruitment Rules, 1987 for promotion from Group 'B' posts to Group 'A' posts. The entire scheme is being re-looked and worked out at the departmental level in consultation with an expert body including the Department of Personnel and the entire process is likely to be completed by 31st December, 2011.

In the aforesaid background, we deem it proper and in the interest of all parties concerned to dispose of both the Civil Appeal as also the Writ Petition without expressing any opinion on the merits of the impugned judgment or the writ petition but with the following directions:

1. All the 3 groups of officers in the feeder categories, i.e., (i) Superintendents of Central Excise; (ii) Superintendents of Customs (Preventive); and (iii) Customs Appraisers, may make representations to the Union of India suggesting the changes which according to them should be made in the Recruitment Rules for their promotion to Group-A post of Assistant Commissioner (Central Excise & Customs).

2. The Union of India shall duly consider all such representations including those made before it in light of the subsequent development in the cadre strength of the 3 feeder categories of group-B services and amend/revise the Recruitment Rules including altering the existing ratio to secure just and fair representation of all the 3 feeder categories.

3. Union of India shall try to complete the entire process by 31st December, 2011, uninfluenced by any observations made in the previous judgment of this Court in All India Federation of Central Excise vs. Union of India &Ors. [(1997) 1 SCC 520], in which the existing ratio was approved as also the observations in the impugned judgment dated 19th December, 2003 of the High Court in Writ Petition (Civil) No. 1324 of 2002 with regard to the jurisdiction of the Central Administrative Tribunal.

4. Having perused one of the Office Orders (No. 51/2011 dated 18th March, 2011), whereby some officers were promoted from Group 'B' to the grade of Assistant Commissioner of Customs & Central Excise in the Pay Band 3 with Grade Pay of Rs.5400/- on purely ad hoc basis, we direct that all such ad hoc promotions shall abide by the final decision to be taken by the Department in terms of this order”.

11. As per Apex court decision dt. 3.8.2011, CBEC in its board meeting held on dt.16.9.2011 took the decision for preparation of RRs by altering existing ratio for 3 feeder cadres to 13:2:1 and also decided to make regularization of all adhoc promotions pending since 97 in old ratio under the provisions of previous RRs. The new RRs were notified on 13.9.2012. The prayer of CBEC for amendment of Supreme Court order dated 03.08.11 seeking clarification to make regularisation of all adhoc promotions pending since 1997 in old ratio was rejected by Apex Court on 30.3.2012. In the old Recruitment Rules, the ratio of 6:1:2 was fixed very unscientifically and the same was not fixed considering the sanctioned strength of three feeder categories for which during the period of 1987 to 2011 one of the feeder categories namely Appraiser took the undue benefit in getting early promotion than the seniors of other two feeder categories. The Recruitment Rules, therefore, are required to be framed to grant promotion on the basis of common seniority list of feeder categories instead of any ratio system. The ratio system is also against the DOPT guidelines because the number of promotional posts is too less.

12. The final recruitment rules, therefore, be framed by prescribing the residency periods as per para 6 and 7 above. The draft on recruitment rules is enclosed herewith as Annexure-1.

(2) DIRECT PROMOTION TO STS POST:

The most of group ‘B’ gazetted officers in the Central as well as State governments are being promoted directly to a Senior Time Scale (STS) post with Grade Pay of Rs. 6600/- in PB-3 including CSS, CPWD, Railway Board, CSSS, AFHQ, Rajya Sabha Secretariat, Forest services, Police services, Foreign Services, Engineering services, State services etc., the Group ‘B’ gazetted officers are being promoted while Central Excise Superintendents are being promoted (if any) merely to a Junior Time Scale (JTS) post with Grade Pay of Rs. 5400/- in PB-3. The Superintendents of Central Excise (Group ‘B’ Gazetted post) should also be granted promotion directly to a Senior Time Scale post with Grade Pay of Rs. 6600/- in PB-3 to maintain parity with similarly placed employees of other departments.

2. Not only the promotion directly to STS post, the counterparts of Central Excise Superintendents are also given benefit of seniority in group ‘A’ at many places in lieu of the service rendered by them in group ‘B’. At many places like various services in Railways, Administrative Services, Police Services, State Services etc., the group ‘B’ gazetted officers are allowed the weightage of minimum of 4 years at the time of entry into group ‘A’ also giving them the due benefit of seniority in lieu of the service rendered by them in the group ‘B’. For example, the officers of Provincial Services in Southern States enter into IAS in a grade pay of Rs. 6600/- within 8 years with 4 years of seniority benefit while the Central Excise Superintendents are unable to enter into IRS in a lower grade pay of Rs. 5400/ even after serving for 35-40 years. They enter (if any) into IRS in a grade pay of Rs. 5400/- only and retire at same level without any weightage for seniority in group ‘A’.

3. The rationale behind such a provision of weightage or direct promotion to STS group ‘A’ is based on the fact of the promotee officers having gained rich job experience at the time of working as group ‘B’ officer as compared to direct recruit group ‘A’ officers. But very unfortunately, the Central Excise Superintendents are not being given the said benefit despite of being served for the longest period in group ‘B’ as compared to any other category of the group ‘B’ employees of the Govt. of India. They are not allowed the benefit of their rich experience even despite of the Adjudication Orders also being prepared by them for the Commissioner level officers.

4. Before the enactment of Indian Customs & Central Excise Service Group ‘A’ Rules, 1987, the group ‘B’ gazetted executive officers in CBEC were allowed five increments in their group ‘A’ pay scale on promotion to group ‘A’ since senior time scale was not available at that point of time. It is also worth to mention that the common entry counterparts of CSS are not only being promoted directly to a STS post after Section Officer (analogous to Superintendent) but also reaching the level of Joint Secretary (GP-Rs. 10000/-). The position in CPWD is even more interesting where an officer with a grade pay of Rs. 4600/- is directly being promoted to a post with a grade pay of Rs. 6600/- (STS) and further directly to a post with the grade pay of Rs. 8700/- from a post with a grade pay of Rs. 6600/-. Thus, they don’t need to serve on a post with a grade pay of Rs. 4800/-, 5400/- and 7600/- for promotion to the post with a grade pay of 8700/- after entry into a post with merely a grade pay of Rs. 4200/-.

5. Further; the Central Excise Inspectors and Assistants of the Central Secretariat Services (CSS), being analogous posts, are recruited through a common entrance examination conducted by the Staff Selection Commission and in a common scale of pay. Once upon a time, the pay scale of the Assistants was lower than the pay scale of the Central Excise Inspectors but was upgraded at par later on. Like it, the pay scale of the Section Officers was also lower than the pay scale of the Central Excise Superintendents once upon a time but was upgraded at par later on. Eventually, the Inspectors are promoted to the rank of Superintendent whereas the Assistants are promoted as Section Officers. The posts of Central Excise Superintendent and Section officer of CSS are analogous, yet the similarity ends here. Section Officers are promoted directly to the Senior Time Scale post with a grade pay of Rs. 6600/- and reach upto the level of Joint Secretary in the grade pay of Rs. 10000/- whereas the Central Excise Superintendents are promoted, if at all, to the Junior Time Scale post merely with a grade pay of Rs. 5400/-.

6. IAS and IPS are the most elite services in the country and the group ‘B’ officers are provided weightage even on promotion to these services in lieu of the service rendered in group ‘B’. But nothing such happens to the Central Excise Superintendents at the time of entry (if any) to IRS, the same also being one of the elite services of the Govt. of India.

7. It is also worth to mention that the Superintendents are not only discharging all functions relating to assessment, investigation & intelligence, drafting of SCN and even adjudication but have also been conferred with the judicial powers of recording statements of various persons in terms of Section 14 of the Central Excise Act, 1944 or Section 108 of the Customs Act, 1962. The statements tendered before the Central Excise Superintendent have a legal binding and are treated as a valid piece of evidence by various courts including the Hon’ble Supreme Court just like the statements tendered before a Magistrate. They also have the adjudication powers pertaining to the cases of their level. However, though the Central Excise Superintendents are performing more responsible work functions as compared to other group ‘B’ gazetted counterparts yet they are facing the worst career prospects instead of being given better treatment. They are being maltreated despite of being the ‘backbone of the government revenue’. In the actual terms, though they are the ‘backbone of the government’ on account of being responsible to earn the finance for the government yet are being totally ignored in every matter.

8. Like CSS, there is a provision of direct recruitment in Group-B non-gazetted and Group-B gazetted posts in CBEC. Hence like CSS , the Group-B gazetted officers of Central Excise and Customs are required to be promoted directly to a post having senior time scale and the Group-B gazetted officers completing 1½ of qualifying service be promoted to STS posts as it was done in CSS during 1999. CBEC also recommended to VIth CPC for direct promotion of Group B gazetted officers to STS posts, separate service, time scale after every 7 years etc. were also recommended by CBEC to 6^th CPC vide F.No.A.26017/147 /06-Ad.II.A Dt. 04.01.07 for these officers.

9. In view of the above, all of the Group ‘B’ gazetted officers of Govt. of India including the Central Excise Superintendents also should kindly be promoted directly to a STS post like many other group ‘B’ officers of the Govt. of India by giving due weightage of the service rendered in group ‘B’ and to bring uniformity in promotions for all for the sake of justice.

10. Hence, it is requested that the study group may kindly be pleased to recommend for promotion of Superintendents of Central excise directly to a senior group ‘A’ post (STS) like many other counterparts of them.

(3) INTRA ORGANISATIONAL PARITY:

The officers belonging to the Inspector cadre, i.e., Inspector of Central Excise, Preventive Officer and Examiner of Customs are recruited through one & the same all India combined competitive examination with the same eligibility qualifications in one & the same organization of CBEC of one & the same department of Revenue performing one & the same nature of duties under one & the same administrative hierarchy under the same Ministry of Finance. All of these three streams belonging to one & the same single cadre of Inspector have also been shown as Inspector only in the Recruitment Rules and other related documents. The Inspectors and Superintendents of Central Excise are uniformed executive officers bearing Ashok symbol on their uniform while the Examiners and Appraisers of Customs are not entitled to wear the uniform.

2. But this single cadre of Inspector has been trifurcated by the CBEC into three streams of Inspector of Central Excise, Preventive Officer and Examiner of Customs with different rates of promotions without any justification re-merging at the level of the post of Asstt. Commissioner. This merger at the level of Asstt. Commissioner again proves that the basic cadre of Inspector has been trifurcated into above stated three streams by CBEC without any valid reason, ground or justification.

3. The Inspectors and Superintendents of Central Excise also work in all of three streams of CBEC namely Central Excise, Service Tax and Customs while the Examiners and Appraisers of Customs work only in the single stream of Customs. But very unfortunately, the officers entering the job at the level of Inspectors of Central Excise and having multi-expertise skill are forced to work under their juniors of Customs even by 20 years entering the job at the same level due to faulty, biased, discriminatory and unjustified promotional policy as well as Recruitment Rules.

4. As a result, the Examiners of Customs belonging to the year of 1994 have already become Asstt. Commissioner while the Inspectors of Central Excise of the year 1975 are still waiting to become Asstt. Commissioner. Not only it, the Examiners of Customs belonging to the year 1988 and 1984 have also become Deputy Commissioner and Join Commissioner respectively. Thus, an officer senior even by 2 decades belonging to the stream of Inspector of Central Excise is forced to work under his junior belonging to the stream of the Examiner of Customs. 99% of the officers joining as Inspectors of Central Excise are retiring after getting only one promotion in a service career of 35-40 years while the Examiners of Customs are reaching the level of Additional Commissioner after getting 5 promotions. The promotional hierarchy of both of the categories is mentioned as below-

A. Promotional hierarchy of Examiners of Customs

(1) Examiner

(2) Appraiser

(3) Asstt. Commissioner

(4) Deputy Commissioner

(5) Joint Commissioner

(6) Addl. Commissioner

(Total 5 promotions with a fair chance of 6^th promotion)

B. Promotional hierarchy of Inspector of Central Excise

(1) Inspector

(2) Superintendent

(3) Asstt. Commissioner (only 1%)

(Total 1 promotion in 99% of the cases)

5. Promotion is an incentive to the working personnel. Hence, the policy of promotion should be designed in such a manner so that an officer can expect his/her progress within a schedule time frame. This principle is absolutely absent in CBEC for the officers except Group A. Since inception of the CBEC in thirties, a series of unscientific, irregular and unjust mismanagement like amalgamated service at the Group “A” level and trifurcated service for the Group “B” “C” and “D” category since 1959 has done gross injustice particularly with the lower officers including Group B executive officers of Central Excise. Merger of Group “A” services has totally shut down the progress of Central Excise employees. A large number of Superintendents of Central Excise are to work in their own organisation under the control of junior Customs officers promoted early and posted as Assistant Commissioner in Central Excise wing. These junior officers drawn from Customs wing supervise the work of Superintendents of Central Excise who by the time even with 20 years of experience at credit are yet Group “B” officers.

6. In order to introduce a systematic and scientific policy of promotion both for the Group “A” and “B” Executive officers, the promotional scope for them is only possible by increasing number of Group “A” posts. But out of the total sanction of Group “A” posts, 50% are going to the direct recruit Group “A” officers. The rest of 50% are again being distributed between the Central Excise and Customs wings. Hence, the scope for promotion of Group “B” Central Excise executive officers to Group “A” has become miserably narrowed. To keep parity with the scientific management, the ratios between the Gr. “A”, “B” and “C” should be meticulously fixed up. This ration can be fixed by increasing more post in Group “A” entry cadre by reducing percentage of direct recruitment from 50% to maximum 10% and also by reservation of percentage quota at all the Group “A” levels, otherwise all promotional vacancies created on account of the retirement of the promotee officers of Central Excise (being promoted to Group A at the fag end of the career, if any) will go to younger generation of direct Group A as well as Customs regularly diminishing the quota of particularly promotee officers of Central Excise.

7. Great framers of the Constitution of India, while framing the Article 309, were under a wrong impression expecting that the top bureaucrats in free India would be unlike to the colonial bureaucrats. Unfortunately, the attitude of the bureaucrats in general has not changed even now. Instead of showing due respect to the Rule of Law & Justice, they act in an awfully irresponsible manner. Therefore, this desperate attempt is being made now to approach the Hon’ble 7^th CPC for the sake of justice as per the Rule of Law and the Constitution of India. Besides the issue highlighted above, there are other aspects to be looked into like discrimination in the prospects of promotions of officers joining particularly at Central Excise Inspector level. The bureaucrats in the CBEC take away all the benefits for themselves depriving lower classes of their legitimate rights, due interests and social status. In a democracy, the legislature works with the commitment and motive of “maximum good of maximum people”. But our bureaucrats, very unfortunately, work with the only motive “all the good for self, ego & power”.

8. There appears to be no sincere efforts by the bureaucrats of the CBEC to eliminate the disparities in promotions of the officers belonging to the basic executive feeder cadre to give equal opportunity for promotions to all Group B officers. The issue should have been settled years ago but for the irresponsible, indifferent & apathetic behaviour of the CBEC authorities having no concern for the honour of the Constitution and dignity of the employees. By sincere efforts and application of mind with unbiased approach, it would be very easy to find a justified, lawful & Constitutional solution to the unreasonably created & long pending issue of disparities in the promotions of the officers belonging to the basic executive feeder cadre.

9. As already submitted, the Inspectors of Central Excise, Preventive Officers of Customs and Examiners of Customs are recruited on the basis of merit- cum-option in through combined competitive examination conducted by a statutory body, i.e., Staff Selection Commission. All of the three classes of officers are appointed to single cadre of Inspector with different recruitment rules in the same organisation of CBEC under the same Department of Revenue in the different Customs Houses and Central Excise Commissionerates in the same level of grade, salary etc. No need to submit that they all are the comparable and analogous posts. They are, thereafter, promoted to the higher cadre posts available in the same Commissionerate/Customs House. This policy of having restrained the promotion prospects and keeping promotional posts confined to the particular Commissionerate/Customs House amounts to be the policy of reservation, while there is no scope for such policy of reservation under the Constitution of India except for the Schedule Caste/Schedule Tribe only. Depriving the senior eligible officers from promotion by such a policy is not only unjust & unfair but also illegal & unconstitutional. There is no provision in the Constitution of India to make rules by benefitting one unduly/illegally at the cost of others. However if such situation happens, it can and should be rectified immediately in the interest of justice and rule of law.

10. The principles laid down in the cases of (i) Union of India versus Virpal Singh on 30-01-1997 (ii) All India Station Masters Association versus General Manager Central Railway AIR 1962 SC 284 (iii) High Court of Calcutta versus Anil Kumar Rao AIR 1962 SC 1704, 1963 (1) SCR 437 (iv) Ajit Singh vrs State of Punjab and (v) Indra Sawhney Vrs Union of India (1992) 3 SCC217 para 845 ; AIR 1993 SC 477 by a 9 Judge Bench are:

“Inequality of such opportunity for promotion as between citizens holding different posts in the same grade may, therefore, be an infringement of Article 16 of the Constitution of India.”

“Equality of opportunity in the matter of promotion means that all employees holding posts in the same grade shall be equally eligible for being considered in the merit for appointment to the higher grade.”

“There would be no discrimination and there is no violation of Article 14 & 16 (1) of the Constitution of India where the quota rule of recruitment has no connection with the rule of seniority”.

11. Thus, no special treatment except as provided under Article 16(4) &16 (4A) of the Constitution of India can be given to any citizen who are otherwise comparable and form a class.

12. The Central Excise Inspectors, Preventive Officers and Examiners form the same class of Inspector as all of them are also mentioned as Inspector in their individual/separate recruitment rules under the same organisation. They are comparable and non-detachable as their recruitment to the post of Inspector is made through a single combined competitive examination conducted by the Staff Selection Commission. Whatever happens, the basic principle of rule of law is that everything else being same, any person lower in merit in the same exam or selected through the later examination cannot become superior to other person being higher in the merit in the same exam or selected through an earlier examination (being applicable for General vrs General, Schedule Caste vrs Schedule Caste and Schedule Tribe vrs Schedule Tribe). Thus, base cadre parity (in r/o executive officers) for the purpose of promotion to Group ‘A’ is the only justified & legal way to remove the disparities among common entry counterparts, i.e., Inspectors of Central Excise, Preventive Officers and Examiners belonging to same cadre of Inspector under the same organisation of CBEC.

13. In view of the, the measures are required be taken to bring parity at least among the intra-organisational group B counterparts in CBEC to undo the injustice being meted out to the Central Excise executive category by being forced to work under their extreme juniors of Customs.

14. It is, therefore, requested to take immediate measures to grant the intra-organisational parity to the Central Excise executive officers with the counterparts of Customs to undo the injustice, disparity and discrimination meted out to the former category.

(4) INTRA DEPARTMENTAL PARITY

The officers belonging to the Inspector cadre of Central Excise as well as Income Tax are recruited through one & the same all India combined competitive examination with the same eligibility qualifications in one & the same Department of Revenue performing one & the same nature of duties of tax collection (Indirect tax by former category and Direct tax by latter category) under one & the same administrative hierarchy under the same Ministry of Finance. The Inspectors and Superintendents of Central Excise are uniformed executive officers bearing Ashok symbol on their uniform while the Income Tax Inspectors and Income Tax Officers are not entitled to wear the uniform.

2. The Inspectors of Income Tax belonging to the year of 1994 have already become Asstt. Commissioner while the Inspectors of Central Excise of the year 1975 are still waiting to become Asstt. Commissioner. Not only it, the Income Tax Inspectors are reaching the level of Commissioner (PB4 post) and the most of them are easily becoming Addl. Commissioner (also PB4 post) whereas 99% of Central Excise Inspectors are retiring on PB2 post of Superintendent after getting only one promotion. Only 1% of Central Excise Inspectors are able to get the PB3 post of JTS Group ‘A’ namely Asstt. Commissioner at the fag end of the career. The promotional hierarchy of both of the categories is mentioned as below-

A. Promotional hierarchy of Income Tax Inspector

(1) Inspector

(2) Income Tax Officer

(3) Asstt. Commissioner

(4) Deputy Commissioner

(5) Joint Commissioner

(6) Addl. Commissioner

(7) Commissioner

(Total 6 promotions)

B. Promotional hierarchy of Inspector of Central Excise

(1) Inspector

(2) Superintendent

(3) Asstt. Commissioner (only 1%)

(Total 1 promotion in 99% of the cases)

3. It is also worth to submit that the IRS officers of CBEC were granted parity in promotions with their counterpart IRS officers of CBDT in the last cadre restructuring of 2001 but no such measure were taken for the Central Excise executive officers namely Central Excise Inspectors and Superintendents to grant parity with the counterparts of CBDT.

4. In view of the above, it is requested to take immediate measures to grant the intra-departmental parity to the Central Excise executive officers with the counterparts of CBDT to undo the injustice, disparity and discrimination meted out to the former category.

(5) INETR DEPARTMENTAL PARITY

The officers belonging to the Assistant cadre of CSS etc. are recruited through one & the same all India combined competitive examination with the same eligibility qualifications in the same pay scale. The Inspectors and Superintendents of Central Excise are uniformed executive officers bearing Ashok symbol on their uniform while the Income Tax Inspectors whereas the officers of CSS etc. are not entitled to wear the uniform.

2. The Assistants of CSS belonging to the year of 1997 have already become Under Secretary (equivalent to Deputy Commissioner), a STS post, while the Inspectors of Central Excise of the year 1975 are still waiting to become Asstt. Commissioner, a JTS post. Not only it, the Assistants of CSS are reaching the level of Joint Secretary (PB4 post) and the most of them are easily becoming Director (also PB4 post) whereas 99% of Central Excise Inspectors are retiring on PB2 post of Superintendent after getting only one promotion. Only 1% of Central Excise Inspectors are able to get the PB3 post of JTS Group ‘A’ namely Asstt. Commissioner at the fag end of the career. The Assistants of CSS of the year of 1985 have already become Deputy Secretary (equivalent to Joint Commissioner). Like it, the Assistant of Rajya Sabha Secretariat of the year of 1985 have already become Director (equivalent to Addl. Commissioner) The promotional hierarchy of the above categories is mentioned as below-

A. Promotional hierarchy of Assistant of CSS

(1) Assistant

(2) Section Officer

(3) Under Secretary (STS post, equivalent to 2 promotions)

(4) Deputy Secretary

(5) Director

(6) Joint Secretary

(Total equivalent to 6 promotions)

B. Promotional hierarchy of Inspector of Central Excise

(1) Inspector

(2) Superintendent

(3) Asstt. Commissioner, JTS post (only 1%)

(Total 1 promotion in 99% of the cases)

C. Promotional hierarchy of Assistant of Rajya Sabha Secretariat

(1) Assistant

(2) Section Officer

(3) Under Secretary (STS post, equivalent to 2 promotions)

(4) Deputy Secretary

(5) Director

(6) Joint Secretary

(Total equivalent to 6 promotions)

3. It is reiterated with due regards that our officers are retiring only with single promotion at a PB2 post in the career of 35-40 years after entering the job as Inspector of Central Excise in PB2 while our counterparts of CSS, CSSS, Rajya Sabha Secretariat, CBDT etc. recruited in PB2 are easily attaining the PB4 levels after getting 5/6 promotions despite of our officers being performed hazardous & arduous duties during the course of discharging executive as well as quasi-judicial functions taking every risk on life of self & family on account of countering with the white collared criminals, habitual revenue offenders & dreaded hardcore smugglers alongwith tremendous administrative pressures.

4. Govt. has adopted measures to bring parity, functional or non-functional, among common entry group ‘A’ officers but no such measures are being taken for group ‘B’ officers. As already submitted, the IRS officers of CBEC got the parity with their common entry counterparts of CBDT in the last cadre restructuring and with other better placed group ‘A’ common entry counterparts including IAS in the current cadre restructuring. Every effort is also being made to promote group ‘A’ officers of CBEC within qualifying service but no such effort has ever been made to promote Central Excise group ‘B’ executive officers in consonance of DOPT guidelines.

5. On account of no efforts being made to bring group ‘B’ common entry counterparts at par, there is huge discriminatory disparity between Central Excise group ‘B’ executive officers and other counterparts resulting in huge discriminatory difference between their salaries, pension and other pre/post-retirement benefits.

6. It is very necessary to take some concrete steps to bring Central Excise group ‘B’ executive officers at par with their best placed common entry counterparts of CSS etc. on the lines of group ‘A’. Otherwise the Central Excise executive officers shall keep working under their juniors even of Customs recruited in the same cadre of Inspector in the same organisation of Central Board of Excise & Customs (CBEC).

7. The parity, functional or even non-functional, with the common entry counterparts may be adopted by taking the measures like below-

(a) Time bound promotions/scales: Time scales after every 7 years were also recommended by CBEC to 6^th CPC vide F.No.A.26017/147 /06-Ad.II.A Dt. 04.01.07 as one of the measures for these officers. No posts will be required to be created for the grant of time scale after every 7 years.

(b) Notional promotions granting batch to batch parity with the best placed common entry counterparts like CSS etc. There already exist so many legal verdicts in the favour of various employees of many other organizations on notional promotions.

(c) Creation of supernumerary posts which will be personal to the officer at each level of the promotion and will be abolished with the retirement of the officer. There already exist so many legal verdicts in the favour of various employees of many other organizations on supernumerary posts.

(d) Creation of separate service: It was also recommended to 6^th CPC by CBEC vide F.No.A.26017/147 /06-Ad.II.A Dt. 04.01.07 as one of the measures. The draft RR’s for separate service have already been submitted to the CBEC by the Association. The separate service for group ‘B’ officers has also been recommended on various occasions by the CBEC and also by the IRS Officers Association. This may be created by taking all of the temporary posts as well as regular posts at group ‘A’ entry level by upgrading these to STS (with the provision of promoting Superintendents directly to STS+half of existing STS posts+additional posts at each level in proportion to CSS.

(e) Direct promotion to higher post/s: Customs Ministerial officers are being promoted as Appraiser without working even for a single day on feeder post of Examiner in CBEC. Likewise, our officers may also kindly be promoted directly to the higher posts at par with common entry counterparts.

(f) In-situ promotions (requiring no creation of posts) after completion of residency periods as prescribed by the DOPT and explained under the forthcoming sub para (i).

(g) Batch to batch functional upgradation at par with the best placed common entry counterparts.

(h) Batch to batch non-functional upgradation at par with the best placed common entry counterparts like CSS etc. (also requiring no creation of posts) based on the precedent of DOPT OM No. AB.14017/64/2008-Estt.(RR) dt. 24.04.09 granting NFU to other group ‘A’ officers at par with IAS.

(i) Re-framing the recruitment rules prescribing the qualifying services in consonance of the DOPT OM No. AB-14017/61/2008-Estt.(RR) dt. 24.03.09 without trifurcating the cadre at group ‘B’ non-gazetted/group ‘B’ gazetted level. This OM stipulates the promotion of the Inspector grade to the grade of Joint Commissioner, Additional Commissioner & Commissioner respectively after completion of 12, 17 & 20 years of service. The validity of this OM was also not questioned by CBEC during the presentation of cadre restructuring proposal on 18.01.11 but CBEC showed its inability to implement the same due to the want of the required number of vacancies/posts. Regarding the want of the required number of vacancies/posts, it is requested that the officers may kindly be granted in-situ promotions after completion of the prescribed service (also requiring no creation of posts) independent of cadre restructuring. A little deviation from the above mentioned DOPT guidelines, already framed with due diligence & application of mind by DOPT, may be understood but the non-implementation of the same at all is never understandable. If the grant of the prescribed grade is not possible within 20 years, we may be granted the same after completion of 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29 or even 30 years (after completion of 1½ times of qualifying service based on the precedent of CSS of promoting all the Section Officers to the STS post of Under Secretary after completion of 1½ times of qualifying service in 1999).

8. The claim of the Central Excise Superintendents becomes even stronger on account of the judicial powers granted to them to adjudicate the relevant cases and recording statements like a Magistrate under Section 14 of Central Excise Act and Section 108 of Customs Act having validity even before the Supreme Court. Not only it, the Adjudication Orders are also being prepared by them for the Commissioner level officers. No such powers have been granted to any Group ‘B’ Gazetted officer of the Govt. of India.

9. Keeping in view the above submissions, it is requested that the due steps may kindly be taken to devise the specific scheme (by means of functional or even non-functional financial upgradation) for bringing the Central Excise group ‘B’ executive officers at par with their best placed common entry counterparts like CSS etc. on batch to batch basis after entry into group B non-gazetted or equivalent grade to undo the injustice, disparity and discrimination meted out to the former category.

(6) MERGER OF THREE GROUP ‘B’ EXECUTIVE NON GAZETTED AND ALSO GROUP ‘B’ EXECUTIVE GAZETTED STREAMS INTO ONE:

The Inspectors of Central Excise, Preventive Officers and Examiners of Customs all are mentioned as Inspector only (belonging to one & the same single cadre of Inspector) in the recruitment rules. The Central Excise Inspector is also mentioned as Inspector of Land Customs in the recruitment rules. Thus, he/she doesn’t only perform the duties relating to Central Excise & Service Tax but also performs the duties relating to Customs. All of above 3 non-gazetted categories of Inspector are promoted to the post of Superintendent of Central Excise & Land Customs, Superintendent of Customs and Appraiser of Customs respectively at gazetted level and re-merged as Asstt. Commissioner at JTS group ‘A’ entry level belonging to one & the same single cadre. But the Inspector of Central Excise & Land Customs is placed far behind the Examiner during this process. As a result, the Inspector of Central Excise & Land Customs becomes junior even by decades to the Inspector (Examiner) of same year despite of being recruited to one & the same cadre. As a consequence, the officers joining as Inspector in 1975 are still waiting to enter into group ‘A’ JTS while the Examiner of 1992 or even latter has already entered into the group ‘A’ STS. It is also well pertinent to mention again that the Examiner of 1984 has already become Joint Commissioner. This injustice & discrimination is required to be undone immediately by granting the parity in promotions to the former category with the later one keeping their relative seniority intact after common entry into the job.

2. Not only the recruitment rules but also the merger of above 3 categories at group ‘A’ entry level prove that all of these relate to one & same single cadre. Despite of it, there is huge difference in their promotional avenues placing the officers recruited as Central Excise Inspector at the worst position to force them working under their extreme juniors of Customs against all norms. This extraordinary situation of discrimination, disparity & injustice happens only in the CBEC under the Govt. of India. As far as the ratio system for entry into group ‘A’ from group ‘B’ gazetted level is concerned, even DOPT guidelines doesn’t mandate it on account of the number of regular posts meant for promotion too less.

3. The extraordinarily acute stagnation being faced by the Central Excise executive officers has also very well been admitted by the CBEC on various occasions. These disparities can only be removed by bringing all Inspectors, Preventive officers and Examiners of same year to same level of promotion through the process of merging all of the three non-gazetted categories and also gazetted categories into one at Group ‘B’ non-gazetted as well as Group ‘B’ gazetted level.

(7) TIMELY CONDUCTION OF DPC:

It is very unfortunate that the Central Board of Excise and Customs does not implement the guidelines of DOPT to grant promotions to the lower officers than group A. OM No. 22011/9/98-Estt. (D) dated 08.09.1998 of DOPT(Govt. of India), interalia provides that the DPCs should be convened at regular annual intervals to draw panels which could be utilized for making promotions against the vacancies occurring during the course of a year. For this purpose, it is essential for the concerned appointing authorities to initiate action to fill-up the existing as well as anticipated vacancies well in advance of the expiry of the previous panel by collecting relevant documents for placing before the DPC. DPCs could be convened every year if necessary on a fixed date. The Department should lay down a time schedule for holding DPCs under their control and after laying down such a schedule the same should be monitored by making one of their officers responsible for keeping a watch over the various cadre authorities to ensure that they are held regularly. Holding of DPC meetings need not be delayed or postponed on the ground that Recruitment Rules for a post are being reviewed/amended. A vacancy shall be filled in accordance with the Recruitment Rules in force on the date of vacancy. Very often, action for holding DPC meeting is initiated after a vacancy has arisen. This results in undue delay in the filling-up of the vacancy causing dissatisfaction among those who are eligible for promotion. It may be ensured that regular meetings of DPC are held every year for each category of posts so that an approved select panel is available in advance for making promotions against vacancies arising over a year. No proposal for holding of DPC should be sent to UPSC until and unless all the ACRs complete and up to date are available. In certain cases involving collection of large number of ACRs, the proposal can be sent only if at least 90% of the ACRs are available”. The Central Board of Excise and Customs does not implement such OM to grant promotion to the grade of Assistant Commissioner. On several occasions, DOPT has instructed that all departments should take action to fill-up the posts in good time before vacancies actually occur. It has also been stipulated by DOPT that responsibility for the delay should be assigned and those responsible should be suitably dealt with, if there is any delay.

(8) REGULARISATION OF AD HOC PROMOTIONS

The Adhoc promotions to the post of Asstt. Commissioner pending since 1997 have not yet been regularized by CBEC. The CBEC is not having up to date dossiers of ACRs/APARs to grant promotions on time. The CBEC does also not issue eligibility lists as per DOPT guidelines to grant promotions. All of ad hoc promotions are required to be regularised immediately as per the recruitment rules existing on the date of the regular DPC against these ad hoc promotions.

(9) INTRODUCTION OF FLEXIBLE PROMOTION/COMPLEMENTING SCHEME:

The problem of acute stagnation existing in the cadre of Superintendent can be solved, if a flexible promotional scheme is introduced for them after joining as Inspector. As per the recommendations of IVth CPC, the flexible promotional scheme was introduced in the Department of Science and Technology. The Vth CPC vide chapter 54 of its report made a number of recommendations for modification of this scheme. The DOPT vide Notification No. 2/41/97-Plc, dated 9.11.98 had made the regulation of in situ promotion under such Flexible Promotional Scheme. It has been further reviewed by DOPT in the light of 6th CPC recommendations and modified Flexible Complementing Scheme guidelines issued vide OM No. AB/4017/37/2008-Esst(R) dated 10.09.10. FCS and MACPS both are also applicable simultaneously.

2. Therefore, we request the study group to kindly be pleased to recommend for introduction of a Flexible promotional/ complementing scheme on completion of qualifying years of service as prescribed by DOPT under OM dated 24.03.2009 for granting of at least 5 in –situ promotions in the service career of each and every Superintendent in the hierarchy of functional promotions after joining as Inspector.

(10) BATCH TO BATCH NON FUNCTIONAL FINANCIAL UPGRADATION TO THE CENTRAL EXCISE EXECUTIVE OFFICERS AT PAR WITH THE BEST PLACED COUNTERPARTS OF CSS ETC.

All the organised group ‘A’ officers recruited with IAS, the best placed group ‘A’ service, in the same pay scale through common entry examination conducted by UPSC have been granted financial parity with the counterparts of IAS. They have been granted non-functional financial up-gradation vide DOPT OM No. AB.14017/64/2008-Estt.(RR) dt. 24.04.09 to compensate the lack of promotions as compared to IAS.

2. As far as the group ‘B’ officers are concerned, the CSS officers are the best placed group ‘B’ officers of Govt. of India like IAS in group ‘A’. The group ‘B’ officers at the level of Inspector of Central Excise and the Assistant of CSS are recruited in a common scale of pay through common entry examination conducted by SSC. The officers recruited as Assistant (Group-B, Non Gazetted) in the Ministries get the benefit of promotions upto the Joint Secretary level, i.e., i) SO with GP of Rs. 5400/- in PB3 after 4 years of service, ii) US (Grade-I) with GP of Rs.6600/-, iii) DS with GP of Rs. 7600/-, iv) Director with GP of Rs. 8700/- in PB-4 and v) JS with GP of Rs. 10000/-. However, their counterpart Inspectors of Central Excise in CBEC recruited as Group-B (Non Gazetted) through the same All India competitive examination get only one promotion in 35/40 years of service career.

3. The Assistants/Section Officers are working in the headquarters offices on policy making seats whereas the Inspectors/Superintendents of Central Excise are working on more important seats of revenue collection in the field formations. Despite of working on more important seats, the Inspectors/Superintendents of Central Excise are not treated at par with the counterparts of CSS. These CSS counterparts are retiring 4-5 grades above the officers recruited as the Inspector of Central Excise. On account of this, the CSS counterparts are getting 60% more pay than the officers recruited as Inspector of Central Excise. Even the pension of CSS counterparts is more than the salary of the officers recruited as Inspector of Central Excise.

4. The Inspectors of Central Excise are recruited in PB2 and also retire on a PB2 post of Superintendent barring around 1% while all of their common entry counterparts of CSS easily reach PB4 levels after being recruited with them in PB2 through the same examination with same eligible conditions. It is also worth to submit that the revenue officers are highly placed throughout the world in the matter of salary, perks and career prospects as compared to other employees but, very unfortunately, our officers are facing the worst prospects in each & every matter.

5. The group ‘A’ officers in the Ministries are selected under Central Staffing Scheme on deputation basis from organized Group ‘A’ Services or from CSS officers being promoted from the post of Assistant/Section Officer but no such opportunity is available for the Inspectors/Superintendents of Central Excise who are not only looking after the work relating to collection of Central Excise duty but also looking after the work of collection of Customs duty (including Inland Air Travel Tax and Foreign Travel (Tax) and Service Tax. Needless to submit that they are already earning the major portion of the govt. revenues. It is also worth to submit that the Govt. of India has regularly been earning the revenue far ahead of the revenue targets in r/o of Central Excise duty, Customs duty and Service Tax particularly due to the efficient, committed & effective efforts of the workforce in the form of Central Excise Inspectors/Superintendents despite of their total demoralisation, disappointment and job-dissatisfaction in r/o pay & perks, career prospects and working conditions.

6. Above facts very well manifest the injustice meted out to officers recruited as Central Excise Inspector despite of the most important work of revenue collection being done by them for govt. During this course, they have been facing every threat including life of them as well as their families by the hard core criminals, smugglers and white collared criminals alongwith tremendous administrative pressures. Thus, the officers recruited as the Inspector of Central Excise deserve a far better treatment in every aspect including pay, perks and career prospects. The grant of the non-functional financial upgradation on batch to batch basis with the common entry counterparts of CSS on the lines of granting the non-functional financial upgradation to all Group ‘A’ officers at par with IAS may really be a solace for these hard working Central Excise officers.

7. The Central Excise Superintendents have been facing continuous acute stagnation for decades. Out of more than 11500 Central Excise Superintendents, around 10000 are already eligible for promotion to group ‘A’ having rendered more qualifying service than required for promotion.

8. As far as the importance of the responsibilities is concerned, the Superintendents are discharging all functions relating to assessment, investigation & intelligence, issuance of Show Cause Notices with the powers of adjudication. They have not only been conferred with the judicial powers in the matter of adjudication but also been conferred with the judicial powers of recording statements of various persons in terms of Section 14 of the Central Excise Act, 1944 or Section 108 of the Customs Act, 1962. The statements tendered before the Central Excise Superintendent have a legal binding and are treated as a valid piece of evidence by various courts including the Hon’ble Supreme Court just like the statements tendered before a Magistrate. No such powers have been conferred to the CSS officers or any other counterparts of Central Excise Superintendents/Inspectors. It is also important to mention that the judicial officers are not only already being highly paid with extra perks but also treated in a far better way in the matter of career prospects than our Superintendents in our country.

9. Though the Central Excise Superintendents are performing more responsible work functions as compared to other common entry counterparts, yet they are facing the worst career prospects instead of being given better treatment. This injustice is being faced by them despite of being the ‘backbone of the government revenue’ on account of being the major revenue collectors for the government in the form of Central Excise duty, Customs duty and Service Tax and also GST in the forthcoming times. In the actual terms, they are the ‘backbone of the government’ on account of being responsible to earn the finance for the government. But very unfortunately, they are being totally ignored in every matter.

10. The parity is the basic concept of our Constitution and the parity in promotions is required to be maintained amongst the similarly placed employees but the Government of India have not initiated any action to maintain parity in promotions as well as pay packages amongst the Group ‘B’ Gazetted and Non-Gazetted officers. The group ‘A’ officers have already been granted financial parity by the Government of India by the grant of non-functional financial upgradation to other group ‘A’ officers at par with the counterparts of IAS. The grant of the batch to batch non-functional financial upgradation after entry into group ‘B’ or equivalent grade is also the immediate need of the time for all group ‘B’ officers to bring them at par at least financially with the best placed group ‘B’ counterparts like CSS etc. The Inspectors and Superintendents of Central Excise are being discriminated despite of collecting the major portion of Government revenues and are not being awarded due career prospects as well as appropriate pay packages.

11. In view of above, it is requested that the study group may be pleased to recommend that the officers recruited as Inspector/Superintendent of Central Excise be granted at least non-functional financial upgradation at par with their counterparts of CSS on batch to batch basis since their initial joining in group B or equivalent grade enabling them to retire in PB4 like their counterparts too. The claim of the Central Excise Superintendents becomes even stronger than other Group B counterparts on account of the judicial powers granted to them to adjudicate the relevant cases and recording statements like a Magistrate under Section 14 of Central Excise Act and Section 108 of Customs Act having validity even before the Supreme Court. Not only it, the Adjudication Orders are also being prepared by them for the Commissioner level officers.

(11) PROMOTING ALL THE SUPERINTENDENTS WHO HAVE COMPLETED 1½ TIMES OF QUALIFYING SERVICE ON THE LINES OF CSS:

During the year 1999, all Section Officers completing 1½ times of qualifying service were promoted on ‘in-situ basis’ to the senior group ‘A’ post of Under Secretary for removal of their stagnation. Keeping in view the extraordinarily acute stagnation of the Central Excise Superintendents, all Superintendents completing 1½ times of qualifying service may also kindly be promoted either on regular basis or in-situ basis. It is worth to submit that all of such officers are already drawing the salary of the higher post/s on account of time scale or ACP/MACP upgradation. It will, thus, require no expenditure. No posts/vacancies will also be required for in-situ promotions. Therefore it is requested that the study group may be pleased to recommend to allow promotions to all the Superintendents who have already completed 1½ times of qualifying service on the lines of CSS.

(12) ENHANCEMENT OF PERCENTAGE OF PROMOTION QUOTA FROM 50% TO AT LEAST 90% IN GROUP ‘A’ RECRUITMENT RULES:

It is also requested that the study group may be pleased to recommend for enhancement of percentage of promotion quota from 50% to at least 90% in Group A Recruitment Rules by making the direct recruit quota maximum to 10%. It will not only give the opportunity to promotee officers to reach the higher levels but the stature of direct Group A service will also be protected.

(13) UNIFORM PROMOTIONAL HIERARCHY:

The Central Excise Superintendents are promoted merely to a JTS Group ‘A’ post whereas many other Group ‘B’ Gazetted officers are being promoted to a STS Group ‘A’ post in the Central as well as State Governments. Promotional hierarchy is also varying department to department. Somewhere Group ‘B’ Gazetted Officers are promoted merely to a post carrying a Grade Pay of Rs. 5400/- in PB3 whereas they are being promoted to a post carrying a Grade Pay of Rs. 6600/- at other places. Like it, somewhere Group ‘B’ Non-Gazetted Officers are promoted to a post carrying a Grade Pay of Rs. 5400/- in PB3 whereas they are being promoted to a post carrying a Grade Pay of Rs. 4800/- or Rs. 4600/- at other places. Somewhere promotional hierarchy is 4600à6600à8700 (CPWD etc.), somewhere 4600à4800à6600à7600à8700 (CBEC etc.) and somewhere it is 4600à4800à5400à6600à7600à8700 (CSS etc.). So, the promotional hierarchy after entry into group ‘B’ is required to be made uniform for the sake of justice to all. The posts under the grade pays of Rs. 5400/- & 6600/- and also Rs. 7600/- & 8700/- being functionally same, the ideal promotional hierarchy for all after entry into Group ‘B’ seems only to be 4600à6600à8700à10000. It is, therefore, requested to make the promotional hierarchy uniform for all Group ‘B’ officers as 4600à6600à8700à10000 on the pattern of CPWD. Where the Group ‘B’ gazetted officers are placed in a grade pay higher than Rs. 4600/-, they all may kindly be promoted uniformly to a post carrying a grade pay of Rs. 6600/-. Thus, the promotional hierarchy should kindly be as below-

“Group ‘B’ Gazetted postà6600à8700à10000”.

(14) TIMELY CADRE RESTRUCTURINGS:

The Cadre Restructuring exercises have not been conducted at prescribed intervals of every five years. Only two cadre restructurings have happened in the history of the CBEC, the implementation of one of which is still pending despite of its process being started in 2006. Prior to it, the cadre restructuring was happened in 2001 without taking any measures for Central Excise Superintendents. The interest of the Group ‘A’ officers was only watched every time paying no heed to the extraordinarily acute stagnation of the Central Excise Superintendents who are forced to retire with single promotion in the career of 35-40 years as well as working under the extreme juniors of the Customs stream.

2. It is, therefore, requested not only to recommend for timely cadre restructurings in CBEC but also to grant the compensation for the unhappened cadre restructurings to the Central Excise Superintendents alongwith conducting specific cadre review individually for the category of Central Excise Superintendents for taking the measures for their entry into PB4 levels like their counterparts particularly keeping the extraordinarily acute stagnation being faced by them.

(15) AT LEAST FIVE FUNCTIONAL PROMOTIONS:

Inspectors and Superintendents of Central Excise have been suffering with extraordinarily acute stagnation for decades. There are many who didn't get any promotion for more than 25 years and they are retiring with single promotion on a PB2 post in the career of 35-40 years whereas their common entry counterparts are easily entering into PB4 with 5-6 promotions after entry into PB2 post. It is also worth to mention that the Central Excise Superintendents & Inspectors are forced to work under their extreme juniors of Customs belonging to one & the same cadre of Inspector and recruited through one & the same process under one & the same organization of CBEC in one & the same department of Revenue of one & the same Ministry of Finance with one & same administrative hierarchy. This discrimination is required to be undone immediately.

2. There should kindly be the provisions to allow minimum actual 5 promotions on functional basis to Group ‘B’ Gazetted officers of CBEC after entry into group ‘B’ or equivalent grade/post like the Group ‘A’ officers in time bound manner or on completion of standard residency periods prescribed by the DOPT. No need to submit that the residency periods have been prescribed by the DOPT with due diligence and application of mind. The officers should get at least the relevant Grade Pay/pay scale, if not the actual promotions, during the prescribed period The Time bound promotion scheme should be introduced in all departments for Group ‘B’ officers particularly including Central Excise Superintendents and Inspectors. If 5 functional promotions are not possible, there should be the provisions of at least 5 in situ promotions in the functional promotion hierarchy in a time bound manner.

(16) TIME SCALE AFTER EVERY 7 YEARS:

The grant of time scale after every 7 years was also recommended to the 6^th CPC by the CBEC as one of the measures to remove the stagnation of Group ‘B’ executive officers. It is requested to bring such a scheme for Central Excise Superintendents as one of the measures to compensate them at least financial loss after joining as Inspector or equivalent grade as one of the measures.

(17) CREATION OF LEAVE RESERVE POSTS:

No leave reserve post has been created at Group ‘A’ entry level in the ensuing cadre restructuring of CBEC. The required number of leave reserve posts may, therefore, kindly be created accordingly as per the rules.

(18) REMOVAL OF REGIONAL DISPARITIES:

On account of being recruited under various Cadre Controlling Authorities, there exist disparities in promotions from the post of Inspector to Superintendent ranging from 12 to 24 years. As a result, there is also a difference in time gap to become Asstt. Commissioner after joining as Inspector. However, these regional disparities keep fluctuating based on various factors. As a result, some officers have reached the level of Addl. Commissioner due to early promotion in the past at some places but, now, they are lagging behind and waiting to be promoted as Superintendent at the same places. Likewise, the officers are able to get early promotion to the post of Superintendent at the places where they were lagging behind the others in the past. These disparities are shown in the following table-

[Batch (Year of joining) of Inspector promoted to Assistant Commissioner]

Seniority Zone	ALLAHABAD	PATNA	MUMBAI	BANGALORE	KOCHI	DELHI	CHANDIGARH	CHENNAI	JAIPUR	INDORE	HYDERABAD	KOLKATA	SHILLONG	BHUBANESWAR	VADODARA
Joining Year	1975	1975	1977	1975	1975	1976	1977	1975	1980	1975	1977	1974	1978	1975	1975
Promotion to Supdt. Of CE	1993	1993	1993	1993	1993	1993	1993	1993	1993	1993	1993	1993	1993	1993	1993
Promotion to Asst. Commr.	2014	2013	2013	2013	2014	2014	2014	2014	2014	2013	2013	2013	2014	2013	2013

These disparities require to be removed and the only way to remove the same seems to grant the affected officers parity with other officers as already submitted above. It is worth to mention that the grant of parity with the inter-departmental (CSS etc.)/intra-departmental (CBDT)/intra-organisational (Examiners) counterparts is the best way to remove these disparities. Such parity will automatically remove all of the disparities.

(RAVI MALIK),

Secretary General.

CENGO INDIA ( DEDICATED TO ALL CENTRAL EXCISE, SERVICE TAX AND CUSTOMS GAZETTED EXECUTIVE OFFICERS)

Wednesday 30 July 2014

OUTLINES OF MEMORANDUM

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