ISLAMABAD: The Senate Committee on Finance, Revenue, Economic Affairs, Statistics and Privatization was informed here Thursday that the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) collected taxes of Rs 2046 billion till now, showing over 7 percent increase.
The meeting of the committee was held under the chairmanship of Qaiser Ahmad Sheikh and attended by Senators Sheikh Fayyaz-ud- Din, Mian Abdul Manan, Syed Mustafa Mehmud, Asad Umar, Abdul Rashid Godil, Nafisa Shah and representatives from business chambers, Finance Ministry and Federal Board of Revenue (FBR).
"We have collected taxes of Rs.2,046 billion till this date which is over seven percent higher than the collection of Rs1912 billion during the same period of last year," Chairman FBR, Dr Muhammad Arshad informed the committee.
However, the FBR Chairman admitted the tax collection for this year was targeted to increase by 16 percent, which so far has shown only 7 percent growth.
The FBR Chairman informed the committee that the export package announced by the government had an impact of Rs18.50 billion on collection of Inland Revenues and overall Rs21 billion impact on collection.
He said that it has been allowed through the policy to reduce the duty on cotton import to 5 percent and that of to cotton machinery to 10 percent, adding SRO in this regard was issued on January 23 which would remain effective till June 30.
The FBR Chairman informed the committee that the commercial import rate of raw material rate was being reduced from 6.5 percent to 4 percent while that of for industrial imports was reduced to 2 percent.
Discussing the budget proposals for the upcoming budget (2017- 18), the representatives of chambers presented various proposals to the committee including providing incentive package for cotton sector, devising mechanism for improving agriculture sector and expanding tax base instead of putting further burden on existing taxpayers.
They also proposed that time should be fixed for the audit of any tax case and there should be gap of 3-5 years between two audits of a same case and also suggested that the taxpayers should not be made withholding agents.
They also suggested reducing sales tax to single digit and highlighted the importance of paying proper attention towards value addition and SME sectors.
It was also proposed that all electrical commercial meters should be provided only on the submission of tax number which would help government enhance taxpayers.
The FBR was suggested to end its harassment policies and treat the filers with respect.
On the occasion, the Chairman of the committee suggested to constitute a sub-committee to consolidate the proposals provided by the business representatives for incorporation in the upcoming budget.
Comments
Comments are closed for this article.