KARACHI:  A bizarre case of theft, tax evasion and illegal registration of a luxury car recently came into limelight the moment after Customs officials raided a house in Defence Housing Authority and recovered a Bentley Mulsanne allegedly stolen from London and registered here with Sindh Excise and Taxation Department, it emerged. Sleuths of a foreign country tracked down exact location of car and informed Customs authorities here, who also took into custody two persons from DHA house and lodged an FIR.

Excise Department was accused as a ‘facilitator’ in evading taxes amounting to over Rs 300 million as provincial government registered luxury vehicle, whose assessed value at time of import was shows as Rs 41.43 million, without permission of foreign ministry and a no-objection certificate from Customs.

 According to FIR lodged against held suspects Jameel Shafi, Naveed Bilawani and an unidentified facilitator of Sindh Excise and Taxation Department and other persons Collectorate of Customs Enforcement Office received a ‘credible’ information from intelligence agency of a friendly country that a Bentley had been stolen from London and their intelligence agency indicated that said vehicle was suspected to be parked in a house in DHA, Karachi. ‘Owner’ failed to produce legal papers of luxury car tracked down by foreign authorities. Accordingly, Customs officials carried out surveillance and after fulfilling legal formalities visited house along with a lady officer and identified vehicle parked there.

Officials asked ‘owner’, Jameel Shafi, to provide legal documents of the vehicle upon which he, instead of producing legal documents gave statement that said vehicle had been sold to him by a person named Naveed Bilwani with terms of agreement that Bilwani would bear all liabilities to clear required documentation from concerned authorities till November 2022. In meantime, Naveed Bilwani also appeared there. On being asked to furnish legal documents of vehicle, Bilwani showed his ‘inability’ to provide requisite documents and was not able to give ‘satisfactory reply’.

Published in The Daily National Courier, September, 05 2022

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