Biratnagar: A customs clearing agent has been found involved in smuggling at the Biratnagar Customs Office. It has been revealed that agents mix uninspected goods with cleared items and deliver them to the warehouses of industrialists and traders.
In this connection, the Biratnagar Customs has taken Kundan Mandal, representative of customs agent Saugat Pokhrel, into custody and handed him over to the police. While clearing customs for 23 types of goods, including imported ready-made clothes from India, Mandal attempted to evade revenue on half the items by clearing only half and trying to transport the rest to a trader’s warehouse, leading to his detention by customs.
Mandal and his two assistants were detained along with a tractor loaded with smuggled clothes, camphor, and other items, as well as equipment used to swap them.
Biratnagar Customs Office Chief Umesh Shrestha stated that a team deployed on special intelligence duty seized tractor number Ko 1 Ta 9717. Upon inspection, quantities of cloth, camphor, and other retail goods exceeding those declared in the form were found, resulting in the detention of agent representative Mandal, his two assistants, and the goods, which were then handed over to the police.
The arrested Mandal is the representative of customs agent Saugat Pokhrel. He had been using Pokhrel’s license number 745 to clear goods from customs. The customs office has suspended agent license number 745.
Mandal is a repeat offender in such cases. He has been arrested twice before in cases involving fraud in customs clearance and smuggling through other border points.
Although Mandal is an assistant to customs agent Pokhrel, sources claim he is personally involved in planning and executing all illegal activities. He is known for repeatedly coming under scrutiny and being an expert in devising various tactics for revenue evasion. In the customs sector, he is considered skilled in adopting different methods for revenue evasion and has been involved in controversies multiple times.
Preliminary investigation suggests that Mandal, in collusion with some customs employees, has been under-invoicing, failing to declare goods, and transporting items to traders’ warehouses without proper inspection for a long time, according to customs suspicions.
Mandal is a repeat offender in such cases. He has been arrested twice before in cases involving fraud in customs clearance and smuggling through other border points.
According to a customs employee involved in the investigation, Mandal employed highly planned methods for evasion. He was found using blind spots in the customs warehouse not covered by CCTV cameras.
“Mandal would take the tractor to such a corner of the warehouse, unload the goods, pretend to inspect them, and clear more items than mentioned in the manifesto,” the investigating employee said. “To smuggle the evaded goods out, he was found hiding them inside an ambulance.”
Deuki Sharma, President of the Biratnagar Customs Agents Association, admitted that Mandal had misused the name of customs agents. “There are 60 regular customs agents in Biratnagar, with 5-6 representatives each,” Sharma said. “They have been tarnishing the reputation of all agents by engaging in misconduct under the agents’ names.”
In connection with this case, another tractor, number Ko 1 Ta 2041, which Mandal facilitated for import, has also been seized by the Revenue Investigation Office in Itahari, where an investigation has begun. The office stated that the tractor, which had already cleared Biratnagar Customs, was detained on suspicion of containing smuggled goods.
The Biratnagar Customs point is considered sensitive for revenue evasion due to the open border with India. Illegal transactions involving collusion between traders, customs agents, and employees cause the state an annual revenue loss in the lakhs. Due to smuggling alone, Biratnagar Customs has failed to meet its annual revenue targets for the past five years. The office has been collecting only 70-75 percent of its targeted revenue.
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