KARACHI: An appellate bench of High Court of Sindh decided Special Federal Excise Reference Application filed in the year 2009, 2014 and 2016 in favor of the applicant companies.
Khalid Javed Khan advocate lead the counsels appearing for the applicant companies and submitted that issue before the court pertains to non-payment of Federal Excise Duty on purported payment of franchise fee to the Principal abroad. He further submitted that this issue has already been decided by the Supreme Court of Pakistan in Civil Petitions No. 1742 & 1743 of 2014 in favor of the tax payers.
The bench perusing the order of the tribunal found that it has been observed/ decided by the Customs, Excise & Sales Tax Tribunal’s bench I, Karachi that there is nothing on record to show that respondents have paid for services either to the Pepsi Cola International (Pvt) Ltd, Hattar which is a Pakistan incorporated company or to Pepsico Inc USA therefore no question of any amount payable by way of Excise Duty for services rendered arises.
The bench then allowed the reference applications with order to send the copy of judgment to the FERA tribunal.