Appellate limitation runs from valid service, which a DIN or unacknowledged dispatch cannot establish.

The Department issued show-cause notices and statements of demand for several periods, followed by orders-in-original dated 30 November 2021 and 20 January 2022. Greaves Cotton filed first appeals on 30 May 2022, relying on the Supreme Court’s extension of limitation in Re: Cognizance for Extension of Limitation; the first appellate authority rejected them as time-barred.

The appellate orders were dated 7 March 2023, but the appellant stated that it received copies from the appellate authority only on 31 March 2025, after making an enquiry. It appealed to CESTAT on 3 June 2025, reckoning limitation from that date of service; CESTAT dismissed the appeals as time-barred.

The High Court heard the appeals under Section 35G of the Central Excise Act, 1944.

Whether CESTAT was correct in dismissing the appeals as time-barred, where the appellant asserted that the first appellate orders were served only on 31 March 2025.

Whether the first appeals, filed on 30 May 2022 after the stated limitation deadline fell on a Sunday, were maintainable.

The Court relied on the statutory service requirement it identified as Section 37C of the Customs Act, requiring an order or notice to be served by registered post or speed post with acknowledgement due.

It treated the date of valid service as material to calculating the time for a second appeal.

The Court also applied Section 4 of the Limitation Act, under which an appeal due on a day when the court is closed may be filed on the next day it is open, and drew support from Sai Auto Industries v. Commissioner, Central Goods and Services Tax and Others, 2026 (3) TMI 1631.

It also noted the appellant’s reliance on the Supreme Court’s limitation-extension orders in Re: Cognizance for Extension of Limitation.

The Revenue’s assertion that the appellate order had been uploaded electronically was unsupported by evidence; the presence of a Document Identification Number established authentication, not service.

The RTI response stated that the order had been dispatched by speed post but did not indicate that acknowledgement due had been obtained, contrary to the service procedure identified by the Court.

The Court therefore treated 31 March 2025, when the appellant received the order, as the date of service and held that the appeal filed on 3 June 2025 was within time.

As to the first appeals, it held that the deadline fell on Sunday, 29 May 2022, and that filing on the next working day was maintainable under Section 4 of the Limitation Act.

The judgment’s paragraph 13 states “30.03.2022”; this appears to be a typographical error, as the preceding facts record filing on 30.05.2022.

It also held the first appeals maintainable and remanded the matters to the first appellate authority for adjudication on the merits, noting that the appellant had not been heard on the merits at either appellate stage.

The civil miscellaneous appeals were allowed, with no order as to costs.