KARACHI: Collectorate of Customs Adjudication-I Collector Dr Farid Iqbal Qureshi heard the Q-Mobile tax evasion case.
Departmental representative of Q-Mobile Afzal Ahmed Bhatti and its authorised dealers Digicom and New Allied Electronics presented before the collector, while the departmental representatives, including assistant collector and superintendent of MCC-Multan attended the hearing first time ever during five hearings.
Both the parties presented para-wise comments before the collector.
Bhatti was of the view that the cellular company brought consignments as per law while following the Statutory Regularity Order (SRO) 280(I)/2013.
However; the MCC-Multan officials said that the SRO-280(I)/2013 was superseded by the SRO-460(I)/2013 issued on 30-05-2013 which has asked the cellular companies to pay sales tax @ 17 percent, 3 percent additional sales tax and withholding tax.
The Adjudication-I collector adjourned the hearing after listening to both parties.
The collectorate had conducted heard the case on 22 September, 13 October, 27 October and 13 November.
The MCC-Multan had submitted a contravention report against Q-Mobile on 26 August in which it stated that the importer Q-Mobile and its authorised dealers Digicom (Pvt) Limited and New Allied Electronics were involved in tax evasion of Rs 772 million in terms of additional sales tax and customs duty by violating SRO-460(I)/2013 in importing around 2.4 million cellular phones of different models and description.
