KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) sought comments from the tax authorities on a constitutional petition filed by Abdul Waheed for the release of his consignment of “cold rolled grain oriented secondary quality”.
A two-member bench, comprising Justice Munib Akhter and Justice Anwar Hussain was hearing the petition. The petitioner challenged the valuation of his consignment on which the customs duty was charged at the rate of 20 percent instead of zero percent.
During the hearing, Masooda Siraj advocate filed the power of attorney on behalf of the department and sought time for submitting para wise comments. Therefore, the court granted time and adjourned the hearing for September 2, 2016.
Earlier, the petitioner’s counsel stated that petitioner is conducting business of import, trade and manufacturing of iron and steel goods under business title M/s Abdul Saleem and Company in Gujranwala.
According to the petitioner, he made a trade agreement for the import of 101,465 kilogram iron and steel goods bearing description chargeable to zero custom duty with a foreign exporter through bank letter worth 4,565,925 euro and filed the goods declaration on June 20, 2014.
The counsel argued that during the examination, respondents claimed that imported goods found to be cold rolled sheets in coils of secondary quality chargeable 20 percent custom duty, petitioner being aggrieved with the examination report and description of goods has sought his right by provisional release of his consignment to avoid huge demurrage charges as well as made request for laboratory test being it’s right for determination of correct description, however, officials of the customs authorities refused his request.
Citing officials of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), Collector of Customs, Collectorate of Customs, Port Muhammad Bin Qasim and others as respondents, petitioner pleaded the SHC may declare that the act of the respondents malafide, unjustified, unlawfully and illegally and court may direct the respondents to release the consignment of the petitioner immediately.
