Restricted rebate claim can still support a separate refund for excess duty paid on a distinct legal basis.

Where an assessee voluntarily restricts a rebate claim before sanction, the sanction order operates only on the reduced claim. The balance amount, being excess duty paid on a different legal footing, is not treated as a rejected rebate component and may be claimed separately as refund. The earlier rebate order does not attain finality against that distinct component, so no appeal against the first order is required to preserve the later refund claim. On that basis, the order denying the subsequent refund was held unsustainable and the relief to the assessee was restored.

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Issues: Whether, after restricting the rebate claim before sanction, the assessee was required to challenge the order sanctioning rebate only for the reduced amount, and whether the separate claim for the balance amount as excess duty was maintainable.

Analysis: The claim initially filed for the full duty-paid amount was subsequently narrowed by the assessee through a letter requesting sanction only at the revised rate of duty. The sanctioning authority acted on that request and restricted the rebate accordingly. The balance amount was not the subject of any rejected rebate claim in the first order, but represented excess duty paid because the applicable rate had already been reduced. That amount was therefore capable of being claimed separately as refund of excess payment, and the earlier rebate order did not attain finality against that component so as to bar the later claim.

Conclusion: The separate refund claim was maintainable, and the assessee was not required to appeal against the first rebate order for the balance amount.

Final Conclusion: The order denying the subsequent refund was unsustainable, and the relief granted to the assessee was restored.

Ratio Decidendi: Where an assessee voluntarily restricts a rebate claim before its sanction, the sanction order is confined to the reduced claim and does not bar a separate claim for the excess duty paid on a different legal footing.

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