Federal Minister for Law, Justice and Human Rights Wasi Zafar has said that the alternate dispute resolution (ADR) system enforced by CBR in tax departments is cost effective and time saving dispute settlement system, and the government is going to introduce this system in other public departments for settlement of civil matters.
"We have amended section 89 of Pakistan Penal Code to introduce the ADR system for settlement of civil matters," he told newsmen after addressing the Alternate Dispute Resolution Workshop-2006 held under the auspices of CBR here on Wednesday. A large number of people from business community, lawyers, consultants, auditors, ex-judges, former and serving CBR officials attended the workshop.
Wasi maintained that issue is being debated in the assembly and arguments in favour and against it are being given by the legislators on the floor. He pointed out that ADR system is not a new concept and was already there and applied in settling family law matters but its implementation level was not up to the mark. According to him, the aim of ADR is to provide speedy and quick justice to people to their satisfaction.
He further said that his ministry had also forwarded a proposal to introduce ADR system in other government departments, according to which, first of all head of a public department will be requested to settle the issue in a month and in case of his failure to do the needful, the matter will be referred to the proposed three-member ADR committee representing all the stakeholders.
Once the matter is referred to the ADR committee, it will decide the issue in three months period, he added. The draft of this system has been sent to the National Assembly, he pointed out.
He further revealed that International Finance Commission (IFC) has offered assistance for training and capacity building of lawyers and other stakeholders so as to run the ADR committees more effectively and efficiently. He said that a training workshop in the regard will be held in Karachi.
Earlier addressing the workshop as chief guest, the federal law minister appreciated the successful working of the ADR committees in income tax, customs, sales tax and central excise departments and said it was a very good step taken by the CBR.
Where there is a concept of discretionary powers of the officers, element of doubt for misuse of the same is there. So ADR is a good initiative taken by the CBR which not only saves time and money of the government but also helps incline people to pay taxes on voluntary basis, he said.
Member CBR (Legal) Mumtaz Ahmed Shaikh gave a detailed presentation on the working and performance of ADR. He said sometime back the CBR initiated tax reforms process with the financial assistance of international donors to make the tax departments more taxpayer friendly.
It was a paradigm shift in CBR under which initiatives such as establishment of MTUS, LTUs and introduction of universal self assessment scheme and ADR reduced litigation burden. The mission of this exercise was to make CBR a modern, progressive, effective, autonomous and credible organisation, he said.
Highlighting performance of CBR he said that out of total 806 cases of customs, sales tax and income tax received by ADR, 87 were rejected, 235 decided, 89 are under process while 395 are pending.
Carey Haslam, a consultant from UK while highlighting the benefits of ADR said it improves business relationship and communication level among all the stakeholders. Other advantages are better management, greater satisfaction from the outcome of the whole process, confidentiality, flexibility of the process, quicker resolution of the conflict and reduction in financial and emotional cost.
Lawrence Kershen, another consultant form UK said that the system was successfully running in the world. Australia and the US have been prime mover of the ADR concept and there has also been a great enthusiasm for ADR in New Zealand and Canada etc. India, Malaysia and Indonesia have also moved toward this system in which dispute is settled between the stakeholders without involving any third party and its results speak by itself.
Earlier Haji Ahmed, Regional Commissioner Income Tax (Eastern Region) Lahore in his welcome address said that CBR had made genuine efforts to initiate ADR, which is aimed at saving precious time of stakeholders. The present CBR leadership is determined to change the existing set up to a modern system, with an efficient and skilled workforce.
Mansoor Ali Shah, member of ADR Committee-II (Income Tax), also spoke on the occasion and stressed upon creating awareness about the system.
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