KARACHI: A divisional bench of High Court of Sindh (SHC) comprising Justice Aqeel Ahmed Abbasi and Justice Abdul Malik Gaddi on Thursday adjourned hearing of a Special Customs Reference Application filed by Collector Customs, Hyderabad, Model Customs Collectorate (MCC) till Oct 13 for paucity of time.
The appeal was directed against order of Special Customs Appellate Tribunal which allowed an appeal filed by Raza Khan Pathan, owner of a Toyota Hiace van model 1997 against confiscation of the said vehicle intercepted at Railway level crossing , Sukkur.
The customs maintains that the vehicle found to have a tampered chassis as per report by the forensic laboratory and thus was imported illegally without payment of custom duty and other taxes. The Customs/applicant conceded that the SCRA is time barred but not due to the fault of the applicant but due to the reason that order of the appellate tribunal was not conveyed to it and applicant learnt about the impugned judgment only after a years or more.
The respondent/defendant maintains that vehicle was duly registered which necessarily implies that all relevant documents including import documents were submitted to the Motor Vehicle Registration authority which after scrutinizing all the documents have issued the registration number.
Today when the SCRA was taken up, the counsel for applicant was not present while Ms. Dil Khurram Shaheen advocate, counsel for respondent was in attendance. The bench however due to shortage of time and heavy board adjourned further proceedings till Oct 13 when SCRA’s of identical nature are already fixed for a final hearing and disposal.