Stop smuggling of gold, not ban its import: Chand

Jewellery sector offers to help govt to curb menace.

ISLAMABAD: Instead of imposing a temporary ban on the import of gold – put in place to curb smugglers’ activities – the government needs to crackdown on the actual act itself, said Haroon Rasheed Chand, president of the Karachi Saraf and Jewellers Group.

The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) decided to impose a 30-day temporary ban in the wake of a steep increase in duty on import of the yellow metal in a neighbouring country. According to credible reports, said the finance minister, this has led to a surge in its smuggling activity.

However, the decision was criticised by Chand who said the smuggling activity needed to be curtailed instead. “The governemtn should act strictly against the smugglers and punish them accordingly,” said Chand. “But the ban on import should be lifted as this is affecting the whole gold and jewellery sector in the country.

He said the representatives of the Foreign Exchange Companies had misled the government into thinking that rupee devaluation occurred due to the import of gold but this was not true.

Chand even offered helping the government in resolving the issue.  “We are ready to help the government provided that it selects real representatives from the country’s gold and jewellery sector for talks to resolve their issues.”

Meanwhile, according to data released by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics(PBS), gold import during the first half of the current fiscal year surged by 45.33 percent to $161.6 million as against $111.192 million during the same period last year.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 28^th, 2014.

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