A sessions court has sentenced a man to one-year imprisonment in a case pertaining to illegal and unauthorised possession of foreign currency.
Additional Sessions Judge (South) Syed Waqar Hyder ruled that accused Muhammad Imran was found in illegal possession of foreign currency in contravention of the Foreign Exchange Regulation (FER) Act, 1947.
He sentenced the accused to one year of rigorous imprisonment and imposed a Rs100,000 fine on him. In case of failure to pay the fine, the convict would have to undergo an additional three-month imprisonment.
“Additionally, the foreign currencies recovered from the accused also stands forfeited in favour of the Federal Government,” the court ruled. However, the judge noted that the prosecution failed to prove the charge of illegal business of sale and purchase of foreign currency against the accused. “The charge u/s 5 of The FER Act, 1947 is not made out since it deals with the payment of foreign exchange made outside of Pakistan in illegal and unlawful manner commonly known Hawala/Hundi,” he added.
The judge said, “It is not disputed rather admitted by the accused that foreign currencies were recovered from his possession. While the law as stated above makes it mandatory for the accused to account for the said foreign currency as to time when and from where he came into possession of the foreign exchange and that while acquiring and possessing the forex he has not contravened the notification or order issued pursuant to the provision of S. 9(a) of the FER Act, 1947 as referred to above.”
The judge noted that the accused failed to provide any sort of plausible explanation on how and when he acquired the foreign currency in question and he also failed to show that he had not contravened the said order issued by the federal government.
According to the prosecution, an inquiry was launched against Imran for his alleged involvement in illegal business of sale and purchase of foreign currencies without having any authorisation from the State Bank of Pakistan. He was doing the illegal business under the garb of “M/s Impressive Pharma” having office at II Chundrigar Road, it said, adding that on December 22, 2022, the FIA team conducted a raid on the office and recovered Pakistani currency worth Rs1,198,250; 19,200 US dollars; 500 Canadian dollars; 15,300 UAE dirham; 500 pids, cheque books and other material.
FIA prosecutor Shehzad Javed contended that the accused failed to produce any valid foreign currency receipt or any authorisation from authorised foreign exchange dealer or State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) to justify the possession of the foreign currency.
He said that all witnesses fully implicated the accused in the commission of the offence under the Section 4/5/23 of Foreign Exchange Regulation (Amendment) Act, 2020, requesting the judge to punish him as per the law.
The defence lawyer, however, argued that the accused was innocent and had falsely been implicated in the case with mala fide intentions and ulterior motives, adding that the prosecution had failed to produce any proof with regard to the offence of Hawala/hundi and possession of foreign currency.
