KARACHI: Pakistan Customs has recovered a massive amount of Rs1,026 millions from different mobile companies including Digicom Telecommunication, New Allied Electronics (a sister-concern company of Digicom), Sana Enterprises, Mustafa Impex and Triple-S Telecommunication Company after the verdict of Islamabad High Court (IHC).
According to the details, the cellular companies had registered cases vide petitions No. 2340/2013 and 1927/2013 in Islamabad High Court (IHC) regarding the issuance of Statutory Regulatory Orders (SROs) 480, 280 and 460 by Federal Board of Revenue (FBR). The cellular companies in the aforesaid petitions challenged the SROs issued by FBR.
In the petitions, the cellular companies denied the sales tax ratio imposed on import of the mobile phones.
They were of the view that the FBR after introduction of 18th Amendment was not authorized to issue any SRO without the consent of Prime Minister of Pakistan and Federal Cabinet.
On the other hand, FBR declared that Prime Minister had delegated the powers to FBR for issuance of SROs, adding that the Pakistan Customs only accepted bank guarantee and Pay Orders (PO) from cellular companies in form of payment and not accepted the Post Dated Cheques (PDC).
According to the Pakistan Customs officer, SRO480 and SRO460 which superseded the SRO280 imposed sales tax up to Rs250 to Rs1000 on import of per cell phone.
According to the details, the Pakistan Customs has recovered an amount of Rs1026millions from six cases altogether– in which two cases of Digicom Telecommunication contained pay-orders of Rs783million and 45million– recovered an amount of Rs84.23million from New Allied Electronics; Rs112million from Mustafa Impex and Rs1.77million from Triple-S Telecommunication company.
