Coercive recovery blocked during pending excise appeal and stay application until appellate authority decides stay request.

Coercive recovery of excise duty and penalty was held unjustified while statutory appeals and accompanying stay applications remained pending before the appellate authority. The text states that, where an assessee has already challenged the adjudication order and sought stay, recovery should not be pursued during the period in which the stay request is yet to be decided. The operative effect is that recovery action must remain in abeyance until the appellate authority considers the stay application, preserving the effectiveness of the pending appellate remedy.

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Issues: Whether recovery of duty and penalty could be taken coercively while the appeal and stay application under the Central Excise Act remained pending before the appellate authority.

Analysis: The petitioners had already filed appeals against the adjudication order and had also moved stay applications. Since the appeals were not being heard and the stay applications had not been considered, coercive recovery during that interregnum was held to be unjustified. Reliance was placed on the earlier principle that recovery should remain stayed until the stay application is decided by the appellate authority.

Outcome: The respondents were restrained from taking coercive recovery steps until the petitioners' stay applications were considered by the appellate authority, and the petitions were disposed of accordingly.

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