Explain briefly safeguard duty levied under Customs Act, 1962.

As per the provisions of Section 8B of Customs Tariff Act, 1975 if the Central Government, after conducting such enquiry as it deems fit, is satisfied that any article is imported into India in such increased quantities and under such conditions so as to cause or threatening to cause serious injury to domestic industry, then, it may, by notification in the Official Gazette, impose a safeguard duty on that article. However, the safeguard duty shall not be imposed in some of the cases. Safeguard duty can be imposed only for a limited period, by way of a notification, after an enquiry. Safeguard duty can be imposed provisionally for a maximum period of 200 days pending final determination of injury. If no duty has been imposed within 200 days of provisional levy or it was determined that there was no serious injury to domestic industry, then the amount collected provisionally is refundable. The safeguard duty is imposed initially for a period of 4 years and is extendable upto 10 years.