Jms Mining Pvt Ltd. Vs State of Madhya Pradesh And Others (Madhya Pradesh High Court)
The petitioner filed writ petitions under article 226 of the Constitution of India challenging the impugned order dated 31.01.2025, in which the Assistant Commissioner of Customs, Indore, rejected the application filed under Section 58 r/w Section 65 of the Customs Act, 1962. Two separate writ petitions were filed by the petitioner challenging the impugned notice for cancellation dated 24.04.2025 and 23.04.2025, respectively.
The petitioner is engaged in the business of mining and production of coal across various locations in the country. The petitioner participated in the auction proceedings conducted by the GOI through the Ministry of Coal and became the successful bidder. The Ministry of Coal issued a vesting letter dated 03.03.2021 to the petitioner whereby the petitioner has been granted exclusive authority to undertake mining operations within the mining area and sale the coal. The petitioner has been granted mining leases of the mines belonging to South Eastern Coalfield Ltd., Western Coalfield Ltd. and other coalfields for the purpose of extracting the coal and selling it in the market. The Central Board of Indirect Tax and Customs made MOOWR Scheme (Manufacturing and Other Operations in Warehouse Regulations, 2019) hence petitioner submitted an online application under the MOOWR Scheme to do the manufacturing in the private lowdown, i.e. mining area. Department made certain queries to the petitioner for which the petitioner submitted clarifications of all the queries in detail. After considering the provisions of Section 58 and 65 of the Customs Act and the provisions of the Regulation, department concluded that the entire large and open mining area of 40795220.49 Sq. ft does not appear to be fit to get licensed as a private bonded warehouse, irrespective of the fact of ownership over the mines or resultant goods. Vide impugned order dated 31.01.2025, department rejected the application on the ground that the MOOWR Scheme is only for the private bonded warehouse and the benefit of the scheme cannot be extended to the petitioner. Hence petitioner filed writ petition. The petitioner has granted a licence to undertake the mining operation at different locations for which the petitioner applied for the grant of a private bonded warehouse, which were also rejected by the department leading to filing of other writ petitions. So far as the other two mines located at Chattarpur and Churcha are concerned, the petitioner had been granted a license u/s 65 of the Customs Act, but now the notice for cancellation has been issued by the respondents on 24.04.2025 and 23.04.2025, respectively.
