Tile importer secures refund of provisional anti-dumping duty

LAHORE: A wall/floor tiles importer has secured a refund of provisional anti-dumping duty imposed by the National Tariff Commission (NTC) on the ground that the Commission had issued a negative final determination, said sources.

They said the Commission had terminated investigation without imposition of any measures once the representative of domestic industry had withdrawn his application regarding injury due to the import of tiles.

After termination of the investigation, the importer sought a refund of the cash deposit received by NTC as provisional anti-dumping duty. The importer was of the view that any cash deposit made during the period of application of provisional measures is to be refunded by NTC within forty-five days of such determination once it makes a negative final determination.

It may be noted that the NTC is authorised to impose provisional anti-dumping duty as a provisional measure to prevent injury to be caused by the domestic industry. Such security deposit acquires the form of anti-dumping duty only once such duty is imposed by NTC after it makes a final determination of dumping cause injury.

However, the NTC declined to refund the cash deposit as security on the plea that the importer cannot claim customs duty and sales tax from the state once it had passed on the burden of the same to end consumers.

But the importer stressed the point that he was asking for the refund of provisional anti-dumping duty, and not customs duty and sales tax.

The NTC, on the other hand, pressed its stance by stating that the grant of allowance and refusal of refund was its exclusive prerogative and since the importer had passed on the liability to consumers, therefore, he could not be entitled to recover it. The importer contested the argument on the ground that the NTC was not entitled to seek documentary evidence as to whether such provisional anti-dumping duty has been passed on to consumers or not.

The relevant forum agreed with the importer stance and directed NTC to refund the cash deposit received as provisional anti-dumping duty within the prescribed period of time.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2024