KARACHI: The Special Court of Customs Taxation and Anti-Smuggling on Wednesday reserved its verdict on bail plea of a suspect who has been booked for attempting to smuggle mobile phones and other electronic items worth millions of rupees into the country.
Judge Syed Faiz Rasool Rashdi reserved the verdict on the bail application filed by accused Waheed Khan after hearing arguments from prosecution and defence sides. The court is expected to announce the verdict on January 7.
According to the prosecution, the customs authorities had received a tip-off that a cartel along with other accomplices had planned to get a container cleared fraudulently under the guise of Transshipment (TP) scheme but they could not succeeded in shifting the container under TP scheme due to fear of being caught by the authorities.
Subsequently, they tried to obtain re-export permission from the customs authorities in the guise of frustrated cargo but their request was not allowed.
However, the consignment was detained and subjected to examination. The authorities found 6,000 mobile phones, LEDs, refrigerated gas cylinders, 35,000 perfumes and other goods stuffed in the container.
According to the details, M/s Essam International-Karachi in July 2015 imported a consignment of miscellaneous goods, but no goods declaration or Transshipment Permit (TP) was filed. The importer was approached that their consignment was lying on the port to which representative of M/s Essam International appeared before the authorities claiming that his national identity card was misused.
Accused Waheed Khan has been alleged to have manipulated the documents for re-export of the consignment.
