PESHAWAR: The Customs House obstructed nefarious attempt of illegal clearance of 1450 vehicle mourned construction machinery consignments at Dry Port Peshawar.
The investigations against the Deputy Collector Customs Athar Naveed revealed that departmental inquiry conducted by officers of Peshawar customs recommended an inquiry against accused person to Federal Board of Revenue.
The record transpires that import of machinery at Dry Port Peshawar started in September 2016 and continued beyond expiry date of the LC i.e. 19.10.2016 and for the time being deputy collector Athar Naveed was serving at Dry Port Peshawar.
After the evidence collected by National Accountability Bureau an agreement was reached among the accused persons, customs officials, customs clearance agents and importers to produce clearance certificate for 1450 vehicle mourned construction machinery consignments.
A total number of 521 consignments were cleared in which 33 were in the legal period of the L.C while 488 consignments illegally cleared in the first cap of a single importer in which customs department assessed.
So timely action against the fraudulent have canceled the import of 929 consignments which have to be imported and illegally cleared till 2019 by corrupt officials at Dry Port Peshawar.
Customs department directed departmental inquiry of the bribery and fraud carried out in presence of Deputy Collector Athar Naveed at Customs Dry Port Peshawar which provided fruitful results and customs exchequer was saved from a big bribery and defamation.
It is important to mention here that the investigations against the deputy collector Athar Naveed was referred by customs department to the Peshawar High Court which directed NAB KP to carry out investigation of this mega scam where machinery of Karachi based importers was illegally cleared at Dry Port Peshawar.
Strict actions must be taken against accused for contributing a loss of Rs 9797.6 million to the customs exchequer by illegally clearing consignments by making joke of Customs laws.
Deputy Collector Ather Naveed at present has been working as deputy collector at Customs House Peshawar for Customs Division Khyber Administration, Import Web Base One Customs Roll Out at Torkham Import-Exports.
Sources said under ‘supervision’ of deputy collector, three appraisers along with seven superintendents of Customs Dry Port formed a group to facilitate corrupt practices and contacted with importers and customs agents who could pay them for carrying out illegal clearance of imported goods and machinery.
The accused persons in violation of Foreign Exchange Manual Customs Acts 1969 and IPO, 2016 cleared consignments assessed by customs department against the actual market value of the said consignments.
Moreover record also divulged that it has been pointed out by the examiners that the import-ability of the machinery may be verified in the lights of the IPO, 2016, however accused persons in order to fulfill the nefarious designs and ulterior motives willfully failed to do so and concealed the fact that LC was illegally extended by a banker, M Arafat, whose name also included in the investigation.
