Retrospective excise amendment treats wire-drawing payments as duty, making export rebate admissible under Rule 18.

A retrospective amendment to Rule 16 of the Central Excise Rules, 2002 and the corresponding Board circular treated amounts paid by wire-drawing units during the relevant intervening period as duty, including at the stage of clearance of drawn wire. On that footing, rebate under Rule 18 was available on exported finished goods because the payment was regarded as duty for export rebate purposes, even though wire drawing had not yet been statutorily declared manufacture for that period. The rebate could not be refused merely on the basis of export, subject to adjustment of any rebate already granted on inputs.

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Issues: Whether the assessee was entitled to rebate under Rule 18 on the amount paid at clearance of exported wire-drawn goods in view of the retrospective amendment to Rule 16 and the departmental circular treating the amount as duty.

Analysis: The claim arose from the intervening period before the process of wire drawing was statutorily declared as manufacture. The retrospective amendment to Rule 16 of the Central Excise Rules, 2002 and the corresponding Board circular clarified that the amount paid by wire drawing units during the relevant period was to be treated as duty, and that the credit mechanism was intended to regularise the duty chain at the input stage, the intermediate stage, and the clearance of drawn wire. Once the amount paid by the unit was treated as duty, rebate could not be denied merely because the goods were exported, and the rebate claim was admissible under Rule 18, subject to adjustment of the rebate already granted on inputs.

Conclusion: The rebate on the exported finished goods was admissible and the revision application succeeded.

Final Conclusion: The impugned orders were set aside and the assessee's claim for rebate on duty treated as paid for the exported goods was allowed.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a retrospective statutory amendment and binding departmental clarification treat the amount paid by an assessee as duty for a past period, rebate under the export rebate provision cannot be denied on the ground that the goods were not otherwise dutiable during that period.

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