KARACHI: Four identical constitution petitions filed by M/s Youngs (Pvt) Ltd importer of Cocoa Powder were dismissed by custom appellate bench of High Court of Sindh comprising Justice Muhammad Junaid Ghaffar and Justice Abdur Rahman.

The petitioner sought declaration that no additional custom duty is leviable on import of Cocoa Powder (HS Code1805.0000) pursuant to clause 3 (vi) of SRO 967(1)/2022 with a further prayer that Petitioners are entitled to the benefit of exemption from custom duty under SRO 1261(1) 2007.

The bench heard counsel for petitioner as well as counsel appearing for Pakistan Customs including Sardar Zafar Hussain and Khalid Mehmood Rajpar Advocates and held that the argument that Petitioners claim for exemption under two different SROs has been denied  in violation of FBR’s letter dated 5.6.2012 is misconceived since for the present purposes, the Petitioners do not appear to be entitled for any exemption pursuant to serial number 3 of SRO 967. The bench further held that Simply this is not a case of denying a claim of exemption under two SROs simultaneously. 

The bench said that in view of facts and circumstances, no case of indulgence is made out and hence all the petitions are dismissed  being devoid of merit.