Case
A company has many units - all having same PAN based excise registeration number. Unit-1 is Manufacturer and it transfers the material to Unit-2 which further exports the material.
Query
Can they adopt the merchant exporter procedure (where UNit-1 acts as Manufacturer and Unit-2 acts as Merchant Exporter) ?
I asked an excise personnel and he told that units of a same company cannot act as manufacturer and merchant, because they are a part of same company. But my opinion is that excise treat all units as different entity and hence it should be permissible.
Please let me know the correct facts, along with exact referance to the statute. (Expert Knowledge required)