Final refund determination cannot be defeated by unjust enrichment forfeiture where assessment, appeal, and revision have already settled refund entitlement.

A refund conclusively determined in assessment, affirmed in appeal and revision, and followed by a consequential refund order cannot later be nullified by invoking unjust enrichment or forfeiture. The Court treated the final departmental findings that tax had been wrongly collected and was refundable as binding, and held that the assessing authority could not pass a fresh order to defeat that quantified refund under the refund or reassessment provisions. The forfeiture order was therefore unsustainable, and the assessee remained entitled to refund with statutory interest.

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Issues: Whether the authority could forfeit a refund already determined and ordered to be paid on the ground of unjust enrichment, and whether such forfeiture was permissible under the refund and reassessment provisions of the sales tax law.

Analysis: The refund had been determined in the original assessment, reduced after reassessment, and thereafter left undisturbed by the appellate and revisional orders. A consequential refund order in Form C was also issued. On these facts, the Court held that the case was not one of unjust enrichment, because the finding that tax had been wrongly collected and was refundable had already attained finality in the departmental proceedings. The forfeiture power under the refund provision was held inapplicable to such a case, and the assessing authority could not disregard the binding effect of the appellate and revisional orders by passing a fresh order to defeat the quantified refund.

Conclusion: The forfeiture order was unsustainable, and the assessee was entitled to refund with interest.

Final Conclusion: The writ petition succeeded, the impugned forfeiture was set aside, and the department was directed to release the quantified refund with statutory interest.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a refund has been conclusively determined in assessment, affirmed in appeal and revision, and a consequential refund order has been issued, the assessing authority cannot invoke the unjust enrichment or forfeiture provision to nullify that final refund determination.

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