CBI booked 6 Customs Officials and 2 Individuals for Nhava Sheva Cartel probe

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has launched legal action against Customs officers and private individuals for allegedly running a cartel involving Customs officials and clearing agents who were clearing goods without paying Customs tax.

Customs Superintendents Brijesh Kumar, Dinesh Kumar, Hemant Gethe, Keshav Pandhi, Vinod Kumar, and Alok Kumar, as well as Ashish Kamdar and Deepak Parekh, have all been charged in separate cases by the CBI.

According to the inquiry, the cartel was clearing consignments of home products using the passports of people who had lived overseas for more than two years.

Customs officers and private individuals conspired to inflict a wrongful loss to the government exchequer. Dutiable commodities were imported by private individuals under the Transfer of Residence law and were given “Out of Charge” by the accused Customs employees.

“Scrutiny of the documents/articles seized reveals that from 2020 till 2022, the accused Customs officials, while posted at UB Centre, Nhava Sheva, entered into a criminal conspiracy with Dahisar residents Ashish Kamdar and Deepak Parekh and unknown Customs officials and private persons to cause a wrongful loss to the government exchequer. Dutiable commodities were imported by private persons under the Transfer of Residence provision and were delivered “Out of Charge” by suspected Customs employees,” the CBI stated in its First Investigation Reports.

“When Deepak Parekh was questioned, he revealed that his nephew Ashish Kamdar also works with him, and the two of them work together to clear household items under Transfer of Residence” (TR). The clearing agents obtain passports from various people who have lived abroad for more than two years and use them to clear consignments of other people’s household items because “if a person has lived abroad for more than two years, he/she can import used household goods by claiming exemption up to Rs 5 lakh,” according to the FIR filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation.

The clearing agencies have accomplices in Gulf countries who assist them in clearing consignments of heavily devalued household items. The Customs officials were allegedly implicated in a Rs 2.24 crore fraud using the Hawala network.