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Duty-free vehicles filled with black money
View(s):Money launderers are paying premium prices and buying up duty-free vehicle permits. The trend, which came to light at a top level conference of Central Bank and Customs officials, had prompted them to examine whether advertising of such permits should be banned. A duty-free permit to import a vehicle now fetches a profit of between Rs. 800,000 and Rs. 1 million.
“We are trying to prevent persons buying vehicle permits in large numbers and giving legitimacy to their undeclared money,” a senior Central Bank official said.
He said that if investigations reveal that anyone had been involved in money laundering legal action would be taken. The Government offers more than 5,000 duty-free permits to ministers, MPs, senior officials, provincial council ministers and religious dignitaries. However after the government relaxed the regulation enabling permit-holders to sell their permits most of them have opted to do so.
The Central Bank has directed the Customs to keep tabs on those importing vehicles on duty-free permits. The Sunday Times learns that during the discussion it was pointed out that the Customs in recent months had made a series of detections of smuggling of foreign currency. A Customs official said legitimate vehicle importers would not be affected by the move as they were registered.