Income tax from government, non-government salaried employees: FBR to seek data from disbursing offices

The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has decided to approach the Controller of Military Accounts, Controller of Air Force Accounts and Controller of Naval Accounts for obtaining data on salaried taxpayers to verify deduction and withholding of tax from Defence employees.
Sources told Business Recorder on Wednesday that the FBR would collect information about salaried individuals from government as well as private organisations. Within the category of government, the FBR would collect data from Accountant General of Pakistan, Controllers of Military/Air Force/Naval Accounts, Provincial Accountants-General, Universities, Education Boards, Autonomous Medical Colleges and Hospitals. In case of private salary, the FBR would contact companies, banks, education institutions, hotels/restaurants and utilise information available with the electronic/print media and advertising agencies.
Sources said that the information would be collected from all those organisations and authorities which are responsible for disbursement of salary to the Defence employees including military and civil employees. Sources said that there are some very important reasons for collecting data from salaried class including those working on Defence forces.
In 2009-10 budget, the proviso to sub section (1) of section 115 of the Income Tax Ordinance 2001 was substituted to provide that where salary income for the tax year is Rs 500,000 or more, the taxpayer shall file return of income electronically in the prescribed form and it shall be accompanied by the proof of deduction or payment of tax as well as wealth statement as required u/s 116.
Now, how the tax department would know about those persons who are earning salary income of Rs 500,000 or more? These salaried individuals are liable to file wealth statements, but the department cannot enforce return filing without sufficient data. Therefore, information is needed from the Accountant-General of Pakistan and Provincial Accountants-General.
Secondly, the department wanted to know about the National Tax Number (NTN) holders, whose tax are being deducted by respective government departments. It would be confirmed whether NTNs were being issued to the salaried persons, whose tax is being deducted. In this way, the tax deductions would be verified through data of Accountants-General offices. Another benefit of the exercise is to monitor the short-deductions made by the withholding agents.
Sources said that the Accountant General of Pakistan and Provincial Accountants-General are not giving proper access to their data. Secondly, these departments are not properly deducting taxes and accurate data is not being maintained by their regional offices. The Pakistan Revenue Automation Limited (PRAL) had tried to improve the faulty software of Financial Reporting and Auditing in Government of Pakistan (PIFRA) in the past.