Unjust enrichment in excise refund: invoice evidence showing duty-inclusive price defeats refund where duty burden was passed on.

Refund of excess central excise duty was denied because the invoice showed the sale price as inclusive of duty, indicating that the incidence had been passed on to the buyer under the sale-cum-lease arrangement. The Tribunal treated the invoice as the best evidence for applying the statutory bar on unjust enrichment under Section 12A of the Central Excise Act, 1944. It also distinguished the cited hire-purchase valuation case, holding that that approach was irrelevant because the dispute concerned refund and passing on of duty, not assessable value. On that basis, the refund claim was held inadmissible.

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Issues: Whether the appellants had passed on the incidence of central excise duty to the buyer so as to disentitle them from refund of the excess duty paid.

Analysis: The refund claim arose from duty paid on cylinders cleared pending approval of the declared value. The decisive question was whether the duty element had been recovered from the finance company under the sale-cum-lease arrangement. The invoice issued by the appellants expressly showed that the rate was inclusive of excise duty, and the Tribunal treated the invoice as the best evidence for determining whether the burden of duty had been passed on, consistent with the statutory scheme under Section 12A of the Central Excise Act, 1944. The reliance on the contrary valuation approach in the cited hire-purchase case was held misplaced because the present dispute concerned refund and passing on of duty, not determination of assessable value.

Conclusion: The incidence of duty was held to have been passed on to the buyer, and the refund was not admissible to the appellants.

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