Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Tuesday, Mar 16, 2004
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Tuesday, Mar 16, 2004 |
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Roadways Industry & Economy - Foreign Trade BSF fiat on Indian Customs House Agents at Petrapole — Govt says present practice will continue for time being Our Bureau
Kolkata , March 15 PETRAPOLE Land Customs Station (LCS), after going through its customary hiccups over a recent BSF notification not allowing Customs House Agents (CHAs) on the Indian side to cross the border for handing over customs documents, is limping back to normalcy. Some 4000 export-laden trucks had got stranded at the border point last week because of the sudden BSF notification. Mr Vinay Bansal, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Commerce, Government of India, in a recent communication to Mr Rajendra Singh, IG, BSF, Kolkata, has advised that till pucca alternative arrangements are made, the present practice of allowing CHAs holding required customs ID papers to cross the border should continue. At a joint border meeting on December 10, 2003 held by Mr Bansal, it was decided that the BSF alongwith Customs, will coordinate with their Bangladesh counterparts the need to do away with the practice of Indian CHAs going across to Bangladesh Customs to get a gate pass. Mr Bansal has pointed out to the IG, BSF that the present practice of allowing CHAs should continue till a satisfactory resolution of the problem is achieved, so that India-Bangladesh trade is not adversely affected in the interim. The prevalent clearance practice for the last three decades has been that the CHAs physically hand over the relevant export related documents to Bangladesh customs to obtain entry pass for Indian export trucks to enter the Bangladesh customs warehouse for unloading cargo. Owing to last week's halt in truck movement, exporters to Bangladesh had to face mounting truck detention charges and cancellation of orders leading to losses and further complexities. Trade associations had sought urgent ministerial intervention for an interim workable agreement with BSF and other associated agencies so that exports could go on smoothly. According to some leading exporters of perishable commodities to Bangladesh, the Indian CHAs should be allowed reasonable time to be adequately prepared to ensure compliance with the BSF notification, which has been issued strictly on border security grounds. Pointing out that the situation was normal and that trucks were getting cleared, Mr Dipen Ghosh, regional manager of Central Warehousing Corporation (CWC) told Business Line that all major works at the 64,000 sq ft CWC warehouse-cum-truck terminal would be completed by March 31, 2004. He said some 54,000 sq ft has been earmarked for export, and the remaining 10,000 sq ft for import and transhipment purposes. The CWC parking lot has capacity for 1000 trucks. He said CWC was now keen to set up similar truck terminals at other important LCS points in North Bengal, starting with Mehidipur.
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