Practice · 01

Customs & taxation.

The founding practice of the chambers: representation and advisory under the Customs Act, 1969 and the revenue statutes, from the Collectorate to the Honourable Supreme Court of Pakistan, on the panels of the Federal Board of Revenue and Pakistan Customs since 2003.

Container cranes over a port at dusk
The border, where the practice began

The practice

Every stage,
every forum.

The firm acts at every stage a customs dispute can reach: before the adjudicating officer, before the Collector (Appeals), before the Customs Appellate Tribunal, in references before the Honourable Islamabad High Court under Section 196 of the Customs Act, 1969, and in writ jurisdiction where the remedy lies there; and since the same questions of classification and valuation decide both the duty and the offence, therefore the advisory work and the litigation are carried by the same counsel.

More than 200 of the firm's cases have been for the Federal Board of Revenue and the Collectorates of Customs, Sales Tax and Excise at Rawalpindi, Karachi, Hyderabad and Peshawar; the same experience serves the importer and exporter instructing against the department.

The Barrister's profile

For importers & exporters

  • Disputes

    Classification & valuation

    Tariff classification and customs valuation disputes, post-clearance audit, and duty, refund and exemption matters under the Customs Act, 1969 and its notifications; including revision petitions against a valuation ruling before the Director General of Customs Valuation under Section 25D, and the appeal that lies from the order made upon them.

  • Seizure

    Seizure & confiscation

    Defence of goods and conveyances seized or confiscated, provisional release, and redemption proceedings before the adjudicating authorities.

  • Appeal

    Appeals & references

    Appeals before the Collector (Appeals) and the Customs Appellate Tribunal; references before the Honourable Islamabad High Court under Section 196; writ petitions where the statute leaves no other remedy.

  • Advisory

    Advisory

    Advice on import and export regulation, exemption regimes and the concessionary notifications, given before the consignment moves rather than after it is stopped.

For the revenue

  • 2003 · present

    Panel counsel, FBR & Pakistan Customs

    More than 200 cases for the Federal Board of Revenue and the Collectorates of Customs, Sales Tax and Excise at Rawalpindi, Karachi, Hyderabad and Peshawar.

  • Prosecution

    Smuggling & fiscal fraud

    Prosecution of smuggling and evasion under Section 2(s) read with Section 156(1) of the Customs Act, 1969, in the customs courts and beyond.

  • Apex Court

    Before the Honourable Supreme Court of Pakistan

    Assistance to the Attorney General of Pakistan in customs and currency-smuggling matters, including Collectorate of Customs v Khudhai Noor.

  • 2003 · present

    Ministry of Finance

    Consultancy through the FBR on public finance management laws, taxation, revenue recovery and procurement under the PPRA Rules.

Selected matters

Two customs
references.

  1. Islamabad High Court · 2016

    Whether a valuation ruling may be applied retrospectively

    A reference under Section 196(1) of the Customs Act, 1969 drafted and argued for the Directorate General of Intelligence and Investigation (Customs) against an order of the Customs Appellate Tribunal, which had declared the valuation ruling in field at the date of import irrelevant and directed re-assessment by reference to a ruling issued two years afterwards. The reference put four propositions: that a notification, a valuation ruling or an executive order cannot operate retrospectively; that goods paid for by "hundi" remittance, outside the letter of credit, the registered contract and the clean remittance permitted by Chapter XIII of the Foreign Exchange Manual, are prohibited goods under Section 16; that only the Federal Government may condone a contravention of the Import Policy Order, and never the Board or its functionaries; and that Section 25A is enabling only, so that the principal method of valuation remains Section 25 and the invoice cannot be admitted without evidence of the price actually paid or payable. Judgement is not reported, therefore no outcome is stated here.

  2. Islamabad High Court · 2020 to date

    Release of a smuggled vehicle against a redemption fine

    A department-side reference against a Tribunal decision releasing a vehicle whose auction papers the issuing authority had certified, in writing, to be wholly fabricated, and for which no document evidencing lawful import was ever produced. The reference turns on the ratio of the Honourable Supreme Court of Pakistan in Collector of Customs v Wali Khan, decided 23rd February 2017, that a smuggled vehicle cannot be released even against payment of a redemption fine with the duties and taxes, and on the proposition that a forum below cannot pass over a government verification report which is on the record and uncontradicted. The matter remains pending, hence no outcome is stated.

Both matters are described without identifying any client or any private party. Where a judgement is reported and public the outcome is given; where it is not, the note stops at the work done and at the propositions argued.

From the journal

Writing from
this practice.

All writing

Instruct the chambers.

Enquiries in customs, taxation and revenue matters are answered from Islamabad.

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