Daily Times

The Chairman Federal Board of Revenue Shabbar Raza Zaidi has urged the trader community against dealing in smuggled goods advising the traders to abstain from purchase and selling such prohibited goods brought into the country by illegal means, while terming such practice as being against the Islamic injunctions and principles and ethical values. But a gross violation of the law of the land was perturbing. At this crucial juncture, such activities on part of business community can jeopardize the government’s initiatives and efforts for economic revival as it adversely affects the local industry, besides causing a colossal loss to the public exchequer and thus compromises the national interest, continued the Chairman.

The initiatives taken and efforts made to deal with the menace of money laundering were examined. Further steps were planned to enhance the vigilance at border points and airports to ensure curbing of cash smuggling. All the field formations shall particularly increase the level of surveillance to prevent the movement of smuggled goods to the markets. Information based anti-smuggling operations need to be conducted with full vigor and all available resources. The Central Region has affected 736 seizures of non-duty paid vehicles and smuggled goods worth Rs. 2178 Million during the period July 2018 till date. The Collectorate of Customs Preventive Lahore made 303 seizures valuing Rs.1150 Million in the period. The Collectorate has made record number of seizures of foreign currency at Allama Iqbal International Airport Lahore as a part of anti-money laundering drive. The current FY witnessed 24 cases of foreign currency seizures equivalent to Rs. 90.2 Million while on the other hand, the seizure cases of gold and narcotics witnessed 100% growth as compared to the last year.

In the line of above initiative, the Member Customs (Operations) Dr. Jawwad Uwais Agha held marathon sessions on 24 & 25th May with Chief Collector and Collectors of the Central Region (Lahore Appraisement & Preventive, Faisalabad and Multan) of Pakistan Customs. During the course of meetings the performance in terms of revenue collection and enforcement operations during the current financial year were analyzed. The strategy was finalized to maximize the revenue collection during the remaining period of the financial year but without compromising upon trade facilitation.

The revenue collection of the Central Region in terms of total duty and taxes comes to Rs 160 Billion which is 6% Customs Duty during the period July 2018 to April, 2019. The collection of Customs duty comes to Rs. 66 Billion which is 32% more as compared to the same period last year. Likewise, the Central Region has collected Rs. 75 Billion as Sales Tax Rs. 17 Billion as Withholding Tax and Rs. 1.7 Billion as Federal Excise Duty.

Similarly, the central region has seized smuggled goods amounting to Rs. 1.5 Billion during the last ten months by taking effective enforcement measures. The recovery of arrears has also been expedited and as a result MCC Appraisement Lahore has auctioned three properties of the defaulters, which was unprecedented in this region.

The performance of the Model Collectorate of Customs (FBR) was specially reviewed. It was observed that MCC Preventive has showed tremendous growth by collecting Rs. 17 Billion in the current Financial Year so far which exceeds the proportionate target by 34% and in comparison with same period of last year it is 67% more. During the month of May 2019, the Collectorate of Customs Preventive Lahore has collected Customs Duty to the tune of Rs. 1195 Million so far which is 20% more than the proportionate monthly target and 94% more than the corresponding period of the last FY.