Re-entry conditions for export goods determine duty liability; incomplete factual examination required remand for fresh adjudication.

Duty demand on granite slabs cleared for export but not exported could not be finally sustained without examining the Rule 97A re-entry conditions. The record did not show a clear order permitting re-entry into the factory, nor proof that the mandatory requirements, including value at the time of return and satisfaction of the competent authority, were met. Because the lower authorities had not properly determined these factual requirements, the order was set aside and the matter remanded for fresh adjudication with a personal hearing.

---

---

Issues: Whether the duty demand on granite slabs cleared for export but not exported was sustainable, and whether the matter required remand because the conditions for re-entry of the goods into the factory under Rule 97A of the Central Excise Rules, 1944 had not been properly examined.

Analysis: The dispute turned on whether the goods had in fact been permitted to re-enter the factory under Rule 97A after the accident and whether the statutory conditions for such re-entry, including the condition regarding value at the time of return and satisfaction of the competent authority, had been established on the record. The available correspondence did not show a clear final order permitting re-entry, and the lower authorities had not examined whether the mandatory conditions under Rule 97A were fulfilled. In the absence of such factual determination, the correctness of the duty demand under Section 11A(1) could not be finally upheld.

Conclusion: The impugned order was set aside and the matter was remanded to the original authority for fresh adjudication after giving the appellants a personal hearing.

Ratio Decidendi: Where the applicability of a duty demand depends on satisfaction of statutory conditions for re-entry of export goods into the factory, and the record does not show proper examination of those conditions, the matter must be remanded for fresh adjudication.

---