Central excise duty attaches on removal, and post-clearance testing at the buyer's premises cannot support refund or provisional assessment.

Central excise duty is chargeable on removal of goods from the factory, and later reweighment or retesting at the buyer's premises does not alter the duty liability. A refund claim based on a post-clearance finding of lesser weight or different chemical composition was held not maintainable because no legal basis existed to revise duty after clearance. Provisional assessment under Rule 9B was also unavailable, as it requires sampling and testing in the prescribed manner at the manufacturer's factory before removal, not testing after delivery. The rejection of the refund claims was upheld.

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Issues: Whether refund of central excise duty was admissible on the ground that the goods, after removal from the factory and duty payment, were later found at the buyer's end to have lesser weight or different chemical composition, and whether provisional assessment under Rule 9B could be invoked on the basis of tests conducted after clearance.

Analysis: Central excise duty becomes chargeable when goods are removed from the factory, and the liability cannot be altered by subsequent reweighment or retesting at the customer's premises. No legal basis was shown for reducing duty merely because the delivered quantity or chemical composition differed after clearance. The plea based on provisional assessment also failed because such assessment contemplates sampling and testing in the prescribed manner at the manufacturer's factory before removal, not testing at the customer's end after clearance.

Conclusion: The refund claims were not maintainable and the rejection of the claims was upheld.

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