Marketability test governs excise duty on intermediate products; unmarketable glass fibre was not liable to duty.

Marketability is an essential condition for levy of central excise duty, and goods that are only theoretically capable of sale are not excisable unless they are marketable in the form in which they emerge from manufacture. On the materials before the Court, the intermediate glass fibre produced in the petitioner's integrated manufacturing process was not shown to be a marketable commodity, and that position was not effectively rebutted. The intermediate product was therefore not exigible to excise duty.

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Issues: Whether glass fibre manufactured as an intermediate product in a continuous integrated process was a marketable commodity and therefore liable to central excise duty.

Analysis: Marketability is an essential ingredient for levy of excise duty on manufactured goods. Goods that are merely theoretically capable of being sold do not become excisable unless they are marketable as such. On the materials placed before the revisional authority and the Court, the intermediate glass fibre produced in the petitioner's integrated manufacturing process was not shown to be a marketable commodity, and the respondents did not effectively rebut that position.

Conclusion: Glass fibre manufactured by the petitioner as an intermediate product was not excisable and was not liable to central excise duty.

Ratio Decidendi: An intermediate product is not exigible to excise duty unless it is a marketable commodity in the form in which it emerges from manufacture.

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