TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2008 (7) TMI 420
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....ders, the vehicles suffer duty at two stages viz. At the stage of chassis and at the stage of fitting the body. According to the petitioner, the petitioner had cleared the body built vehicles on payment of appropriate excise duty for home consumption as well as for export under claim of rebate. The export of the body built vehicles under the claim of rebate was effected from the factories of the body builders and not from the factory of the petitioner. According to the petitioner, it filed 47 claims of rebate/refund against the exports made during the period from July, 1994 to January, 1997. The total amount claimed as refund was Rs. 1,17,42,752/-. In respect of 29 out 47 refund claims, the department issued show cause notices to the petitioner proposing to reject the refund claims. The reason stated in the show cause notices for rejection of refund claims was that the petitioner had not exported fully built motor vehicles directly from their factory and that the petitioner has manufactured only the chassis of motor vehicles and not complete motor vehicles in their factory. The Assistant Commissioner of Central Excise adjudicated the show cause notices by his order dated 11-3-1996 ....
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....e applications for refunds initially filed by the petitioner were incomplete and that those applications got completed only after the order was passed in the appeal dated 30-7-1999, and that payment of refund has been made within three months thereof, and therefore, no interest is payable to the petitioner. 3. The learned Counsel appearing for the petitioner submits that the applications for refund under Section 11B of the Act is required to be made in the prescribed form. The petitioner had made such applications in the prescribed form. Admittedly on that application, an order for refund has been made. The learned Counsel submits that in the order passed by the Commissioner (Appeals) dated 30-7-1999 or in the order of the Deputy Commissioner who passed the final order after remand, sanctioning refund, there is no finding that the applications of the petitioner filed for refund were incomplete. The learned Counsel submits that the applications filed by the petitioner furnished all the details required to be given by the Rules and it had also submitted all the documents which are required to be filed with the applications, and therefore, according to the learned Counsel, the petiti....
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....eipt of any such application, the [Assistant Commissioner of Central Excise or Deputy Commissioner of Central Excise] is satisfied that the whole or any part of the duty of excise paid by the applicant is refundable, he may make an order accordingly and the amount so determined shall be credited to the Fund : Provided that the amount of duty of excise as determined by the Assistant Commissioner of Central Excise or Deputy Commissioner of Central Excise under the foregoing provisions of this sub-section shall, instead of being credited to the Fund, be paid to the applicant, if such amount is relatable to- (a) rebate of duty of excise on excisable goods exported out of India or on excisable materials used in the manufacture of goods which are exported out of India; (b) unspent advance deposits lying in balance in the applicant's account current maintained with the (Commissioner of Central Excise); (c) refund of credit of duty paid on excisable goods used as inputs in accordance with the rules made, or any notification issued, under this Act; (d) the duty of excise paid by the manufacturer, if he had not passed on the incidence of such duty to any other person; (e) the duty of e....
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....e application, the applicant has to mention the amount of which refund is claimed, he has to mention the ground on which he claims refund and he has to enclose documents in support of the claim. He has also to give details of the Challan and the date showing payment of duty. Perusal of the provisions of Section 12A of the Act shows that they also relate to duty paid on the goods. Perusal of the provisions of sub-section (2) of Section 11B of the Act shows that after receipt of the application, the Assistant Commissioner has to hold inquiry to satisfy himself that the duty has been paid by the applicant and that it is refundable and has to make an order accordingly. In the present case, the refund application of the petitioner was first rejected by the Assistant Commissioner by order dated 18-3-1996 on two grounds viz. (i) that the condition of the goods being exported directly from the factory or warehouse of the manufacturer stipulated in notification no. 41/94 in respect of the claims filed thereafter, has not been met, and (ii) the description of the goods cleared on payment of duty from the factory does not tally with that of the goods exported. This order was set aside in the ....
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....been observed thus :- "However, I find that while it is accepted by the Assistant Commissioner that the exporter had manufactured and cleared chassis fitted with engine for body building under Chapter 8707 on payment of duty and that duties were also discharged on body building activity and the goods subsequently exported, there is no indication that any correlation of the goods, subjected to body building thereon, were made with reference to the unit chassis no. and engine no. available on these goods." It is, thus, clear that the appellate authority found that the Assistant Commissioner had found that the duty was paid when the chassis was cleared from the factory of the petitioner and the duty was paid also after completion of the body building on that chassis. The appellate authority has found that, however, no attempt was made to correlate the chassis number mentioned in the duty paying document in the factory of the petitioner with the number of chassis mentioned in the document whereby the duty was paid on the bus and therefore, thereafter the appellate authority observed thus :- "As long as the duty paying documents issued, evidencing payment of duties under Chapter sub-....
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....ant Commissioner. The only thing that was not done and the appellate authority had directed to be done was correlation of those documents to find out the identity of the chassis numbers and the proceedings were remanded by the appellate authority only for establishing correlation. Thus, we find that the findings recorded by the Revisional authority in the impugned order that the applications submitted by the petitioner for refund were not complete and were completed only on production of certificate pursuant to the appeal order, is unsustainable. 8. Now it will be necessary to see the provisions of Section 11BB of the Act which reads as under :- "Section 11BB : Interest on delayed refunds. - If any duty ordered to be refunded under sub-section (2) of section 11B to any applicant is not refunded within three months from the date of receipt of application under sub-section (1) of that section, there shall be paid to that applicant interest at such rate, [not below five percent] and not exceeding thirty per cent per annum as is for the time being fixed [by the Central Government, by Notification in the Official Gazette], on such duty from the date immediately after the expiry of thr....