Judgment:
1. In this appeal filed by M/s. R.V. Steel Rolling Mills, the matter relates to the eligibility of the appellants to the benefit of Notification No. 206/63, dated 30-11-1963 as amended. The appellants had paid central excise duty as applicable to the Iron and Steel products falling under sub-item (ia) of Item 26AA of the old Central Excise Tariff and had cleared them at appropriate rate of central excise duty. Subsequently, they filed refund claims on the ground that their final products i.e. Iron & Steel products falling under sub-item (ia) of Item 26AA were eligible for the benefit of Notification No.206/63 aforesaid. They were producing the Iron and Steel products from the duty paid steel ingots. Their claims were rejected by the adjudicating authority the Asstt. Collector and his order was confirmed by the Collector of Central Excise (Appeals) in his consolidated order dated 30-6-1988.
2. Appearing for the appellants, Shri Y.N. Chopra, Consultant submitted that their raw material was steel ingots and before actually producing bars, rods, etc., the Steel ingots were cut and broken and thus, they should be taken as semi-finished steel for the purposes of Notification No. 206/63-C.E. He also submitted that the Collector of Central Excise (Appeals), had not granted them any hearing and prayed for remand of the matter. He also stated that their contentions had not been specifically discussed by the appellate authority.
3. In reply, Shri P.K. Jain, SDR stated that the matter is very old and no purpose will be served by remanding the matter. The law is settled in so far as the interpretation of this Notification is concerned. The Steel ingots, which were the raw material of the appellants were separately covered by Item 26A of the old Central Excise Tariff and the semi-finished steel referred to in Notification No. 206/63-C.E. only refers to sub-item (1) of Item 26AA of the Tariff.
4. We have carefully considered the matter. There is no dispute that the appellants were manufacturing Iron & Steel products out of the steel ingots. Steel ingots were classifiable under Item No. 26A of the old Central Excise Tariff. The products of the appellants were classifiable under Item 26AA of the Tariff and they were producing the goods which were classifiable under sub-item (ia) of that Item No.26AA. The Notification No. 206/63-C.E., dated 30-11-1963 (as amended) provided exemption to Iron [and] Steel products falling under sub-item (ia) of Item 26AA if made from any of the following materials or a combination thereof :- (i) Fresh un-used re-rollable scrap on which the appropriate amount of duty of excise had already been paid, (ii) Semi-finished steel including blooms, billets, slabs, sheet bars, tin bars and hoe bars on which the appropriate amount of duty had already been paid, 5. The ld. Consultant had submitted that they were cutting and breaking the steel ingots before they were used in the manufacture of their final products - Iron and Steel classifiable under sub-item (ia) of Item 26AA. We find that the semi-finished steel as referred to in the Notification is that semi-finished steel, which was classifiable under sub-item 1 of Item 26AA, which covered the following :- "Semi-finished steel including blooms, billets, slabs, sheet bars, tin bars and hoe bars." The Iron and Steel products manufactured out of steel ingots classified separately were not covered by the provisions of Notification No.206/63-C.E., dated 30-11-1963. Cut ingots could not be considered as semi-finished steel.
6. Shri Y.N. Chopra, Consultant had pleaded that no personal hearing was given to them by the ld. Collector of Central Excise (Appeals). We find that the Asstt. Collector, who had adjudicated the matter had given proper hearing to the appellants as is apparent from para 5 of his order. The Collector of Central Excise (Appeals) had recorded in his order that he had examined the appellants' pleas as put forth before him at the time of personal hearing. He has recorded as under :- "I have carefully gone through the impugned orders and examined the appellants' various pleas contained in the appeal petitions and put forth before me at the time of the personal hearing." 7. This is an old matter in which the refund claims were filed as early as in the years 1973-74. We had perused the relevant exemption notifications and the applicable tariff entries and we find that there is no case on merits. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in a number of cases had observed that in old matters there should be no remand and that when the facts are clear and the Tribunal could take a decision in the matter then the remand was an exercise in futility. In the case of Dimple Overseas v. CC, Kandla - 1995 (80) E.L.T. 10 (S.C.), the Hon'ble Supreme Court had held that after giving a clear finding on a question relating to merits of the case the Tribunal had remanded the matter to the Collector for de novo adjudication; such a remand was exercised in futility. When the Tribunal considers the evidence sufficient to record a finding on merits, appropriate course was to decide the entire appeal instead of remanding the matter to the Collector (Head Notes). In the case of Indu Ben Ashok Rao Nalvade v. Dhiraj Lal Surati -1995 (61) ECR 553 (S.C.), the Supreme Court had held that the first Appellate Authority should re-appreciate evidence and come to the grips of the issue and not follow a casual and cursory approach and that the matter being old should be decided finally instead of remand.
8. In this case, we are only concerned with the applicability of Exemption Notification No. 206/63-C.E. when the Iron and Steel products were made out of steel ingots. We are not concerned with any other exemption. The fact that the steel ingots were cut and broken before use in the final products will not make such steel ingots the semi-finished steel for the purposes of sub-item (1)of Item 26AA.9. In view of the above, as the facts and circumstances of the case are clear, there is no ambiguity on facts and the legal provisions are settled, we do not consider any merit in this appeal. As a result, the appeal is rejected.