SQ421

I disagree. Lots of things have improved, and I (like many others here) have never had any problems dealing with Customs and Immigrations at Indian airports. Things are undeniably smoother and quicker. You got unlucky to have professional grade (I am assuming) camera equipment in your bag, and it piqued the officers curiosity. You, are as much culpable for having paid the bribe, as the officer who solicited one. Having a whinge on an IBB is not going to help me except maybe find some like minded posters who'll agree with you in "Indian Customs" bashing.

A better alternative would've been to pay the duty and then take up the matter for a refund.

At inbound immigration, onus lies on the person seeking entry to a country to convince the immigration officer that he/she intends to exit the country before their visa expires, and should the person fail to convince the officer, entry can be denied even if a visa has been previously issued. Similarly, I'd imagine it is your responsibility to prove to the customs officer that the goods on your person are not for importation.

I really don't see what your objection is to them going through your baggage, and whether your view of that action is slanted because of the fact that they harassed you for the bribe. Customs in any and every other country is well within their rights to search any inbound passenger's baggage. This happens a lot at inbound immigration in a lot of countries, and I imagine your objection to this action stems only from the fact that you were being harassed to pay a bribe. I do not see how you get to call them ba$tard$ for going through your baggage

B747-437B

I arrived this afternoon in Mumbai from Dubai on Emirates carrying an Indian passport and was waved around the X-Ray machines while they spent their time focussing on the "goras" who were carrying well in excess of their duty free alcohol allowances!

d3vski

It must be human nature, when we get selected for something, it always seems like we are being picked on. Everybody loves good whinge (and im guilty as well!) about government authorities!

GUWonder

How much time do you budget to try to reach that "refund" if in the same situation? How long would it take most people to successfully get the "refund" without it involving some "service" fee? People have issues getting refunds too.

candadep

The OP's complaint about the customs officials makes little sense to me. You take out expensive stuff out of the country, you declare it, keep the receipt and show it on return. Period. 'Nuff said. IMHO, calling these officials rude names is totally uncalled for.

As far as the other poster (Brahmin) is considered, I wonder what his response would have been if he had been stopped by customs authorities in any other country while bringing in excess liquor. The poster's action (spitting etc.) is simply in poor taste not to speak of rude behaviour.

I think the problem here is the 'holier than thou' attitude of the Indian who returns home from foreign shores. And of course, there are a few who have an inflated sense of their importance, because they travel frequently out of India.

-----csp

GUWonder

An owner of an item adulterating the contents of their own possession so as to reduce or eliminate its value for other parties is within the rights of the owner of the item.

But why do even that at the airport? Is paying the official duty on such an item prohibited or is it that the import tariff is greater than the value of the bottle to the owner?

SeeBuyFly

I started traveling in the seventies when all luggage was always opened (both in India and the US). Since then I have seen huge positive changes. Regulations have been dramatically relaxed and I, personally, am never stopped anywhere any more. Still, laws do exist and they can be enforced. There's no point in whining about that. Just like being caught for speeding, the fact that other people get away with it, or you got away with it last time, is irrelevant.

I believe the duty-free limit for people of Indian origin is now Rs. 24,000, which is huge compared to what it used to be, but it's still only about $500. If you exceed it, or if you bring in too much liquor or something, most of the time no one will catch it, but you don't have some sort of special right to evade the rules.

I'm not denying that some Customs officials are looking for opportunities to extract a bribe. So follow the rules and don't give them any opportunity. The last time I was asked to open my luggage in India, in the late eighties, I remember laughing at the guy and saying "you're wasting your time". He gave up quickly.

FedUp2

Easier said than done, especially when much of the electronics (especially expensive photo gear) sold in India is without any kind of official receipt.

If faced with a similar situation, I would have created a scene and asked for the supervisor (Asst. Collector of Customs, on duty at CSIA) to protest; but I readily admit that not everybody has my fighting genes

SQ421

The gear is sold without any kind of official receipt to avoid taxes/duties in the first place. Lack of an official receipt means the sale is never recorded on the dealers books and sales (and other city/state) taxes are not reported back to the Revenue Department.

That being the case, I'd say Customs are well within their rights to demand proof of purchase for any expensive gear (photography related or otherwise) being brought into India without any proof of purchase.

If a person has bought expensive electronic gear without demanding a receipt, this avoiding taxes/duties, and is then jagged by customs and required to pay applicable duties on that item, sorry - no sympathy there.

SQ421

Well if the OP is going to make noises about having had to pay a "bribe", then I'd say the refund route would be the right thing to do, even thought it might be time consuming.

If on the other hand, one pays a bribe to save themselves the time taken to pay the duties and then later obtain a refund, then I do not think its appropriate for them to later crib about the fact.

The OP had the choice to
a) Pay duty and get a refund after conclusively proving that the gear was not being imported
b) Pay a bribe being demanded by the officer and go on his way having saved himself time and money (I imagine the "bribe" was less than the applicable duty on that particular item)

The OP landed in this situation because he did not have sufficient documentation on his person to prove that the gear was not being imported. He had the two aforementioned choices and decided to go with option b.

I don't think that gives the OP any moral high ground for abusing the custom officers for going through his bags and basically, doing their job.

GUWonder

Paying the duty will ordinarily be taken as an admission by the duty-paying party that they recognize that a duty was owed.

Do you even know how the "refund" route would go in India in an import-export matter when there is a major miscalculation in a custom's assessment and payment of duty was already made?

What refund, at what cost?

Neither a corruptly, artificially-inflated duty amount nor a bribe should have been demanded or taken by customs -- it's perfectly appropriate to be critical of what the passenger was subjected to upon re-entry into India even if having furthered the corrupt atmosphere in small part.

Why place the burden of appropriate customs behavior on just the passenger? That's a false choice regardless.

There were more than two choices for the passenger, but there were multiple choices for the involved customs employee(s) and they decided to behave inappropriately. No one forced customs employees to take bribes, they collect the bribes because they are corrupt -- and as they are corrupt, they look for targets to shake-down and do solicit for bribes.

Given the passengers being solicited for a bribe in order to avoid paying a corrupt customs official's artificially-inflated duty figure, the moral lower ground is that upon which the involved customs officials stand.

SQ421

I do not condone the actions of the customs officials, if any of my posts give an explicit impression that I do, then that is certainly not the case.

And the OP could have avoided paying the duty if he had carried enough documentation to prove that the goods were purchased in India. If the OP could not conclusively prove it as such, then I believe duty was owed.

Having spent most of my life in Bombay, I believe I do. The route is not easy, but it would be the right thing to do. OP paid the bribe to avoid this correct, albeit time consuming route.

What refund, at what cost?

And customs wouldn't have required the OP to pay the duty, or gotten an opening to demand bribe if the OP had followed the rules in this regard and carried documentation to prove that the goods were purchased in India OR registered those goods before flying out of India, thus documenting that the goods could in fact be brought back into the country without paying any duty.


Because the onus lies on the passenger to prove that he is not importing anything into the country without paying the requisite duties. When I show up at Australian Customs, carrying medicines without any prescription, I do not argue with the officers. If they do not wish to let me carry those items in the country because I lack a certain documents, then I dispose them off in the quarantine bins.


Again, I do not condone the behaviour of the Customs employees. At the same time, the opening to demand any bribes would've been left unopened had the OP done the right thing and carried appropriate documentation.


The officer does stand on the lower moral ground, but by paying the bribe, the OP himself loses any moral high ground he might have had. Morality is not a zero sum game.

GUWonder

Do you suggest that passengers carry documentation that the used underwear in their checked baggage -- or even the suitcase holding the underwear -- is such that it does not require payment of duty upon entry (back) into India?

Ridiculous as the above question may sound to some at first glance, the situation is materially no different when confronted by corrupt customs employees.

The primary problem -- whether customs picks up underwear, a suitcase or a camera -- is that corrupt customs employees can claim whatever they want and then -- whether by law or not -- shift the burden (of demonstrating an article as not subject to duty) onto the owner of the goods and place them into an awkward situation.

This placing of the burden upon the passenger needs to change as it does nothing but coddle corrupt officials and those little Napoleons on a power-trip.

B747-437B

There is a third choice, which is the correct one in this situation - viz. to surrender the items to customs to place in bond until one is able to either provide the documentation proving it is duty-exempt or pay the duty. It is a bit of a pain, but if one doesn't have the required documentation in hand, then it is the most cost-efficient one.

safari_7

I do admit, it was my fault for not having the appropriate documentation. Yet, I was not given the option of paying by credit card the dutiable amount. They flatly denied it. Where in the world do I go to secure 45,000 rupees in cash? Does an ATM even give out that much amount? They knew all along that they had an easy carcass to scavenge on......

If they wanted to go through the duffel bag, why didn't they do so in the first place? Why did they want to scavenge it looking for goodies after the camera case discovery? Why parade used underwear and socks one by one in front of the world to see?