KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) has ordered conditional release of a consignment of solar led street lights.
The importer has been directed to either deposit differential amount of duty and taxes in shape of pay order or bank guarantee with Nazir of the court or submit Alternative Energy Development Board (AEDB)’s letter regarding exemption from duty and sales tax and concurrence of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) for release of the consignment.
The court was hearing the petition filed by Mirza Jamil Baig who moved the court against show-cause notices issued to him for evading millions of rupees in customs duty and taxes through mis-declaration and claiming exemption from duty and taxes on import of solar led street lights.
The petitioner’s counsel submitted that his client was awarded a contract for installation of solar lights in municipals and towns of Sukkur by Sindh’s Rural Development Department. Subsequently, he had imported a consignment of 1,060 solar led street lights and got the consignment cleared, getting exemption from duty and general sales tax as imported items fall within category of renewable source of energy and therefore, the government had exempted duty and tax on their import.
He said that the petitioner imported another consignment containing 4,120 solar led street lights and filed general declarations along a letter of Alternative Energy Development Board (AEDB) regarding exemption from duty and tax and concurrence of FBR.
However, he lamented that his consignment was not cleared. Instead he said, the petitioner was issued show-cause notice for evading Rs 21.581 million through mis-declaration and claiming exemption from payment of customs duty and general sales tax on his first consignment. He said that he was also issued another show-cause notice in respect of his second consignment.
Advocate Kashif Nazir, who represented the customs authorities, told the court that the petitioner mis-declared the PCT Heading and got cleared his consignment under PCT Heading 4905.1090 which does not cover lights imported by the petitioner. The lights imported by the petitioner are classifiable under PCT Heading 9405.4090 and are not exempted from sales tax. The petitioner was only given exemption from customs duty on his consignment.
