KARACHI: The hearing of thousands of cases pertaining to Afghan Transit Trade were adjourned till Dec 21 as court observed that these cases require case management so that basic controversies involved are decided while hearing the main petitions filed by different petitioners/appellants.

The issue in hand pertains to the responsibility of cross border certificate. Whether the clearing agent or National Logistic Cell is responsible for the documents certifying that the goods destined for Afghanistan under transit trade reached their final destination (in Afghanistan-Torkham border) is the main controversy as Customs department holds clearing agent for cross border certificate while clearing agents/importer shift burden onto NLC.

When the Special Customs Reference Application (SCRA) 334 of 2015 was taken up, all the counsel including Ghulam Hyder Sheikh of Franklin Law Associates, Zain Jatoi and others were in attendance while the representative for customs department were also present.

One of the counsel drew the attention of the court to interim order passed by the court, the court agreed that it could not proceed with the case unless the “case management” is completed so that the law points raised in these hundreds of petitions and identical in nature are dealt with and decided as such. The bench also took on record two statements identifying more identical cases.

The bench then with the consent of the parties fixed Dec 21 as the next date of hearing.