ORDER
M. Santhanam, Member (J)
1. The revision application filed before the Government of India, on transfer to the Tribunal is being treated as an appeal.
2. The appellants hold Central Excise Licence for manufacture of goods falling under Tariff Item 68. The appellants manufacture various articles of silver. Silver falls under Item 24 of the First Schedule and is exempted from payment of excise duty under Notification No. 24/65, dated 28-2-1965. On 27-10-1978, the appellants filed a classification list. In the remarks column, they mentioned that articles of Silver falling under Tariff Item 24 were exempted from the whole of the duty of excise leviable thereon by virtue of the Notification aforesaid. The Silver articles were products like silver rods, silver anodes, silver sheets. Silver plates, silver contacts, silver bi-metal contacts, silver contact material in the form of wire, sheets, strips etc. The Assistant Collector made An assessment that in respect of articles mentioned as a, b, c, d & e in Part-III, duty is leviable at 5% ad valorem. An appeal was preferred to the Collector of Central Excise (Appeals), Bombay who rejected the same.
3. The appellants did not appear despite the notice to them and we have heard Shri. A.K. Jain, SDR for the department.
4. In the revision application the appellants have contended that it is unjust to interpret the term “silver” to be silver ingots and deny the benefit of the exemption of the Notification (cited supra). The Tariff Item 24 is “silver” in general and silver not particular form. It is to be construed to mean silver in all forms whether in the form of ingots, wires, bars, sheets or in any other form whatsoever. They have referred to the decision of the Bombay High Court in Garware Nylons Ltd. 1980 ELT 249 where the Bombay High Court has stated that the substances or manufactured articles, are to be classified according to the general and commercial usage, and known denominations of such articles. The appellants state that the Tariff Item “silver” will include silver in all forms including articles.
5. Shri A.K. Jain, SDR stated that the Tariff Item referred to “silver” and not to “articles of silver”. According to him, the reference was to the metal and not to the products made out of the metal. Silver in A.D. Merriman’s Dictionary of Metallurgy, has been defined as follows :-
“One of the noble metals that is not oxidised in air either in the cold or when heated. It is white in colour and one of the most ductile and melleable of the metals”.
In Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, Volume-Ill “silver” is defined as white metal element that is sonorous ductile very malleable capable of high degree of polish and chiefly univalent in compounds that has the highest thermal and electric conductivity of any substance that is found native and also compound as in stephanite, argentine, proustite, pyrargyrite, that is obtained as the main product arid as a by-product in copper and lead smelting that is one of the noble metal in view of its resistance to oxidation or corrosion except tarnishing by combination with sulphur that usu. alloyed with copper to increase its hardness and that is used for coinage, tableware, jewellery plate and a great variety of articles in photography, in electrical contacts and as catalyst.
He argued that the definition of silver would indicate that item in the Central Excise contemplate only the metal and not the products.
6. The point for consideration in this appeal is whether the Tariff Item 2k would include articles of silver. The Tariff Item 24 describes the goods as “silver”. The entry is without any further qualification. The dictionary meaning of the term indicates that it refers only to the metal. Even in common parlance the term would denote only the metal and not articles or products therefrom. The appellants want the term “silver” to be interpreted as silver in all forms whether in the form of ingots, wires, sheets or any other form whatsoever. This contention cannot be accepted and the Tariff Item has to be strictly interpreted. It must be noted that while describing Item 27 it is specifically mentioned as aluminium in any crude form including ingots, bars, slabs, billets, shots etc. It is significant to note that in sub-item (b) the aluminium articles such as plates, sheets, circles, strips etc., have been specifically indicated. The absence of such a description in the case of Tariff Item 2k is significant. It is reasonable to conclude that the entry contemplated only the metal and not any other articles made out of silver. The Appellate Collector has rightly held that the contention of the appellants was not correct.
7. In the result, the appeal fails and is rejected.
V.P. Gulati, Member (T)
8. I agree with the conclusions of Brother Shri Santhanam so far as the levy of duty on articles of silver, which are subject matter of this appeal, are concerned. I would like to add the following regard to scope of the term ‘Silver’ as used in the Tariff.
9. The term ‘Silver’ as described in the Webster’s Dictionary sets out the characteristics of silver metal as an element, its production and uses but does not give an indication as to the scope of the term ‘Silver’ as understood in the trade and those dealing with silver. In the absence of definition of term ‘Silver’ in the Tariff, the scope of it has to be understood with reference to the trade parlance criterion. I agree with Brother Shri Santhanam that in common parlance term silver denotes only metal form and not articles or products therefrom. The question that remains to be further considered is as to which forms of silver would be covered by term ‘silver’ and which would fall outside its scope. In my view such of those forms in which silver manufactured and are used for their metal value for manufacture of other articles which have distinctive characteristics and uses of their own would be covered by the term ‘Silver’. This would cover ingots, bars, slabs, billets and shots and even wires etc., which have no other uses except as metals for fabrication of other articles.