KARACHI:-Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar of High Court of Sindh (SHC) Tuesday deferred order in a compromise decree seeking appearance and NOC from KPT having a claim over confiscated goods, which were auctioned on the orders of the Court.
The counsel for plaintiff Sirius Logistics Pakistan earlier told the court that plaintiff is not pressing his suit against Chairman Federal Board of Revenue and Collector Customs. He sought an order in an application seeking release of rupees 9,000,000 lying with Nazir of SHC. The plaintiff demands his expenses for freight in respect of 61 used old vehicles imported more than a decade back
Shakeel Ahmed Advocate, counsel for Chairman FBR and Collector Customs agreed to the compromise and said Customs already has deducted rupees 20,300,000 from the sales proceeds while depositing rupees 9,000,000 with Nazir and hence has no objection if the suit is decreed or application by the plaintiff is allowed.
The bench pointed out that one of the necessary parties to the suit and defendant Karachi Port Trust (KPT) has not agreed to the proposed decree based on compromise between the parties. The bench inquired from the KPT counsel who said that he has no specific instructions.
It is a question of rupee 5,100,000 against claim of KPT for holding the imported confiscated goods and under the Customs rules, holder of goods is entitled to a share in sales proceed, the bench said referring to section 201 of Customs Act 1969.
The bench asked the KPT counsel to call some senior responsible officer from defendant KPT to appear and make a statement only then the matter could proceed. The bench then put of further proceedings until Oct 07.
The confiscated 61 vehicles were auctioned for rupees 2,9300,000 on the orders of the court sometime in the year 2007 and since then issue of sharing the sale proceeds and decretal amount was pending since then.