Assessable value exclusion for freight and insurance charges upheld on identical facts, excluding buyer-collected amounts from central excise valuation.

Freight and insurance charges collected from buyers were held not includible in the assessable value of goods under Section 4 of the Central Excise Act, as the issue was treated as settled by an earlier tribunal decision on identical facts involving supply of cylinders to oil companies. That prior ruling was applied directly to the present matter, leading to the conclusion that such charges could not be added to assessable value. The impugned order was set aside and the appeals were allowed with consequential relief, if permissible under law.

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Issues: Whether freight and insurance charges collected from buyers were required to be included in the assessable value of the goods cleared by the assessee under Section 4 of the Central Excise Act.

Analysis: The issue was treated as already settled by a prior tribunal decision on identical facts involving supply of cylinders to oil companies, where freight and insurance charges collected from buyers had been held not includible in assessable value. The earlier decision was regarded as directly applicable to the present case.

Conclusion: Freight and insurance charges were not liable to be added to the assessable value. The impugned order was set aside and the appeals were allowed with consequential relief, if permissible under law.

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