Proprietor held for evading customs duty for importing Pakistani dates

New Delhi: A proprietor of the firm who tried to evade customs duty of approx three crores for importing Pakistani dates was arrested by customs. Officials have gathered intelligence that some importers have filed bills of entry at ICD Tughlakabad for import of dry dates of Pakistan by misdeclaring the country of origin as Oman, Dubai and Iran.

"These importers have adopted this modus operandi to evade the basic customs duty of 200 percent which has been imposed by CBIC notification on goods exported or originated from Pakistan," said Sanjay Sharma, joint commissioner of customs.

He further added that importers in connivance with some persons of Pakistan and Dubai with the help of some shipping lines devised a modus operandi wherein they brought the goods first from Pakistan to Dubai and then on a fresh bill of lading the same cargo is transported from Dubai to India in the same container or in a different container.

"In trade parlance, such fresh bill of lading are known as switch bull of lading which is basically used to hide the origin port. With the help of these switch bill of lading and cross stuffing of containers these importers have been initiated by the SIIB branch of ICD Tughlakabad," said Sharma. Adding further, he said that one such importer has filed six bills of entry through two different CHAs for import of eight containers of dry dates mentioning the country of origin of goods as Iran.

"Intelligence was gathered that all these eight containers were loaded on a vessel at Karachi port. During the probe, the goods valued more than one crore were seized and proprietor of the importing firm was held," said Sharma.