Sindh Revenue Board (SRB) will achieve its annual budgetary revenue target of Rs 120 billion in current fiscal year, said SRB chairman, Khalid Mehmood. During his visit to Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI), Mehmood said that the provincial revenue authority collected Rs 44.373 billion during first six months of ongoing fiscal year, registering 14.36% growth as compared to the collection made during preceding period.
Furthermore, he said that the SRB could have achieved 21 percent growth in 1HFY19 if the restriction on collecting Sindh Sales Tax (SST) on pre-paid and post-paid cellular telecommunication services had not been imposed. He added that the SRB, which has expanded its tax ambit to 29000 taxpayers, would hopefully achieve its annual budgetary revenue target of Rs 120 billion for tax year 2018-19, despite serious difficulties.
He also assured to take business community on board in order to find viable options against their grievances and added that Sindh had the lowest SST rate as compared to other provinces. Junaid Makda, president KCCI said that although the KCCI was an approved Non-Profit organization under clause C of sub-section 26 of section 2 of the Income Tax Ordinance, 2001, the chamber received notices pertaining to the enrollment with SRB under section 24 of the Sindh Sales Tax on Service Act 2011 and urged the chairman SRB to withdraw such notices and grant exemption to the chamber.
Furthermore, he said that all tour operators dealing in religious tourism should be exempted from SST as Punjab Revenue Authority also did the same for religious tourism. Later, Siraj Kassim Teli, chairman Businessmen Group (BMG) said that Sindh Chief Minister, who was heading the SRB, should inform the taxpayers where the SRB collection was being spent and stressed upon the SRB chairman to publish city-wise revenue collection ratio to make the taxpayers aware about their contribution in the provincial kitty. A large number of KCCI members attended the meeting.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2019

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