Tirumala Seven Hills Private Limited Vs Commr. of Customs (Airport & Admin) (CESTAT Kolkata)
The dispute in this appeal before the CESTAT Kolkata concerned the eligibility of Optical Switch Units or Optical Line Protection (OLP) equipment imported by the appellant for concessional Basic Customs Duty (BCD) at 10% under Notification No. 57/2017-Cus, later aligned with Notification No. 02/2019-Cus dated 29.01.2019. The appellant classified the goods under CTH 85176290, a classification that the Department accepted. The sole question involved whether the imported equipment could be treated as switching apparatus eligible for concessional duty, or whether the goods fell under excluded categories such as Optical Transport Equipment (OTE) or Optical Transport Network (OTN) products.
The appellant argued that the equipment was merely a switching device for protection of fiber optic lines, automatically switching traffic between primary and standby fibers upon detecting failures. They emphasized that the goods did not perform activities such as transmission, multiplexing, routing, regeneration, or networking functions, and therefore should not be treated as OTN/DWDM equipment. Citing case law and technical distinctions, the appellant submitted that OLP equipment is not equivalent to OTN products and is intended only for redundancy. They contended that the wording of the exemption notification covers switching apparatus, and that OLP equipment fits squarely within that scope. They therefore sought setting aside of the impugned orders and refund of excess duty.
