Unjust enrichment in customs refund fails where facts show duty was not passed on to consumers.

In customs refund matters, concurrent factual findings that the duty incidence was not passed on to consumers will defeat the plea of unjust enrichment and sustain the refund claim. The Court accepted that the sale price of the final product was comparable to that of other sellers using non-duty-paid identical capital goods, and that the depreciation entries on the imported capital goods had been written back without tax benefit to the 100% EOU. On those facts, the refund remained payable to the assessee and was not creditable to the Consumer Welfare Fund.

---

---

Issues: Whether the respondent-assessee was entitled to refund of customs duty on imported capital goods, or whether the refund was barred by the doctrine of unjust enrichment and liable to be credited to the Consumer Welfare Fund.

Analysis: The refund claim had been sanctioned by the appellate authority and upheld by the Tribunal on a factual finding that there was no material to show that the duty element had been passed on to consumers. The sale price of the final product was found to be comparable with that of other sellers using non-duty-paid identical capital goods. The depreciation entries on the capital goods had been written back and credited to the profit and loss account, and the assessee being a 100% EOU was found to have derived no tax benefit from the earlier depreciation claim. The Court held that the reliance on unjust enrichment did not displace these concurrent factual findings.

Conclusion: The refund was held to be payable to the assessee and not creditable to the Consumer Welfare Fund.

Ratio Decidendi: In refund matters under customs law, where concurrent findings of fact show that the incidence of duty has not been passed on to consumers, the doctrine of unjust enrichment does not defeat the refund claim.

---