ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) has restrained the Customs Adjudication from announcing decision in a tax evasion case against Warid Telecom until further orders.
As per the details, the company is facing charges of tax evasion and under-invoicing on the import precious software worth $6.63 million. The software was purchased from a software company, Ericson. The Islamabad Customs had imposed Rs 233 million in wake of duty/taxes following the original price of the software, but the company earlier refused to get it cleared and later imported the same software at Lahore from Ericson through under-invoicing by paying Rs 4 million duty/taxes instead of Rs 233 million.
It might be possible that more cases will be registered against the company on the violation of Customs Act, as the customs authorities are currently reviewing to lodge a case of money-laundering against the Warid and Ericson.
The case is under trial before Customs Adjudication Collector Dr Akhtar Hussain, while the company moved the IHC and got stayed order against announcing the decision by the adjudication.
It was revealed during hearing of the case that Air Freight Unit (AFU), Islamabad while stocktaking found a CD, imported by the Warid, but it was not got cleared. When company officials were contacted, they asked the customs to auction the said CD as it was imported mistakenly.
It was also revealed that the company later imported the software at Lahore and got it clear by paying duty/taxes amounting to Rs 4 million.
The customs has submitted the record of correspondence among Lahore Customs, Warid and Ericson before the Customs Adjudication.
