Business Recorder op-ed writers Huzaima Bukhari, Dr Ikramul Haq and Abdul Rauf Shakoori have highlighted an issue of a very high import in their latest contribution to the newspaper titled “Determining fair income tax base”.
These eminent writers have concluded their argument by saying that “It is about time the new government in making took appropriate action and ordered FBR to pay refunds of 15% collected from 90 million whose income is not chargeable to tax.
Simultaneously, FBR will get a tax base of 30 million individual income tax payers. Refund to millions not chargeable to tax for the last 10 years will help those suffering due to economic miseries during an historic high inflation period.
This is their money and should be returned to them not as charity but as a matter of right—a beginning to establish rule of law (fair income tax base).” I couldn’t agree more. Yes, FBR must be asked to make payment of refunds of tax collected from 90 million individual taxpayers whose income is not chargeable to tax. FBR must raise taxes only from those with an ability to pay.
Having said that, I wish to draw the attention of readers of this esteemed newspaper to a grim reality: the absence of a tax culture in Pakistan, which is an admitted fact. And, I strongly believe that we will never have one owing to a variety of reasons. Despite numerous efforts aimed at broadening the tax base or determining what actually constitutes a fair tax base, nothing meaningful has been achieved so far. In my view, the country’s taxation structure is strongly characterized by an absolutely flawed and unjust approach to tax collection. Moreover, ours is perhaps a country where making payment against due taxes is considered something beneath one’s own dignity, so to speak. It is unfortunately also a country where tax evasion is openly encouraged and promoted.
Shah Hamid Dehlvi (Karachi)
Copyright Business Recorder, 2024
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