Adjustment of duties of excise

Petitioner, a beverages company, contended that vide. notification issued by the Federal Board of Revenue, exercising discretion under S. 6(3) of the Federal Excise Act, 2005, it disallowed adjustment of duty on concentrates in all forms, which had the effect that the duty paid by the petitioner on the concentrate used by the petitioner was no longer deductible at the time of sale, thereby the entire burden of the excise duty , at time of input and at time of output of produced goods, was shifted on the petitioner; that S. 6(1) Federal Excise Act, 2005 conferred a vested statutory right upon the petitioner to deduct excise duty, which could not be taken away by S. 6(3) of the Act, and that S. 6(3) of the Act was therefore, ultra vires the Constitution as the Federal Board of Revenue was not competent to exercise legislative authority

Validity

Legislation was the exclusive domain of the legislature and even the Legislature could not delegate the power to the executive but the Legislature had no authority or domain to ensure the implementation of the intent of the Legislature at the grass root level, which was the domain of the Executive

Legislature, in the present case, performed its duty through the promulgation of the Federal Excise Act, 2005, wherein guidelines and principles were laid down for the collection of excise duty in accordance with the mandate of the Act, and it was left to the discretion of the Executive, that was, the Federal Board of Revenue, through the impugned S. 6(3) of the Act, to disallow or restrict wholly or partly the adjustment of excise duty already paid on input goods at time of calculation of duty on manufactured goods from the input goods

Subsequent notification issued by the FBR was within the mandate given to it by the Legislature, and in the exercise of said mandate, the FBR had not done any legislation but had exercised discretion on the Executive side for the calculation of the excise duty, and on such score, exercise of delegated authority under S.6(3) of the Federal Excise Act, 2005 was not unconstitutional or illegal

Petitioner had not been singled out and had been treated like other beverage companies, and there was thus no violation of its fundamental rights

Federal Board of Revenue, in the present case, had acted fairly and have exercised authority in a just manner

Constitutional petition being without merit, was dismissed, in circumstances.