Facts of the Case

M/s. Bebo International, a partnership firm dealing in rice exports from East Godavari (now Kakinada) District, Andhra Pradesh, challenged Notification No. 31/2015-2020 dated 08.09.2022 issued by the Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT), which banned/prohibited export of broken rice (HS Code 1006 40 00) with effect from 09.09.2022. The petitioner had a pre-existing export contract (No. 23/P/00136 dated 15.07.2022) for 15,000 metric tonnes of broken rice with Olam Global Agri Pte Ltd, Singapore, and sought a direction permitting it to fulfil that contract despite the ban, along with restoration of the writ petition after an earlier recall application.

Issues Involved

  1. Whether the DGFT's export-ban notification should be set aside insofar as it affected pre-existing, contractually committed export consignments.
  2. Whether any relief remained necessary once the parties indicated there was nothing left to adjudicate.

Petitioner's Arguments

  • The export ban notification, and the refusal to allow export of consignments contractually committed before the ban, was arbitrary, illegal, violative of natural justice and of fundamental/constitutional rights.
  • The petitioner should be permitted to export the 15,000 MT of broken rice under its pre-existing purchase contract.

Respondent's Arguments

  • No specific opposing submissions are recorded in the final order; by the time the matter was taken up, learned Senior Counsel for the petitioner itself stated that nothing remained for adjudication.

Court Order / Findings

  • The Court recorded the submission of Senior Counsel for the petitioner that nothing remained for adjudication in the writ petition.
  • The writ petition was accordingly closed, with no order as to costs, and pending miscellaneous applications were closed.
  • The Court did not rule on the legality of the DGFT export-ban notification or on any GST issue — none was raised in this matter.

Important Clarification

This is a Customs/Foreign Trade Policy matter concerning an export restriction on broken rice under the Foreign Trade (Development and Regulation) Act framework administered by DGFT — it has no connection to GST law, and readers should not read any GST holding into this order. It is included here only because the site's owner has directed publication of all matters in this batch, however tangentially tax-adjacent their captions may appear.

Sections Involved

  • Foreign Trade (Development and Regulation) Act, 1992 — under which DGFT notifications restricting exports are issued.
  • Article 226, Constitution of India — writ jurisdiction invoked to challenge the notification.
  • Section 151, Code of Civil Procedure, 1908 — invoked for interim relief and restoration applications.

Decision – In Favour of

Closed without any adjudication on merits — the petitioner itself stated nothing remained for adjudication, so there is no finding either way on the export ban's validity, and no GST issue arose at all.

Case Details

  • Court: High Court of Andhra Pradesh at Amaravati
  • Case No.: Writ Petition No. 1296 of 2023
  • Coram: Hon'ble Sri Justice Ravi Cheemalapati
  • Date of Order: 21 September 2023

Link to Download the Order

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