Major urban cities: Valuation of immovable properties to be increased to 90pc

ISLAMABAD: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) Friday informed the Senate Standing Committee on Finance that the valuation of immovable properties in major urban cities would be increased from 75% to 90% of the market rate through the issuance of notification in July, 2024.

The FBR also intends to introduce a simplified scheme for retailers as during the voluntary period of the Tajir Dost Scheme it miserably failed.

Senator Faisal Vawda while talking to a select group of reporters said after the Senate panel meeting that the budget would be passed at all costs.

Immovable properties: Hike in advance tax on purchase likely

FBR’s Member Inland Revenue (IR) Operation Mir Badshah Wazir informed the committee that we are going to revise upward the valuation rates of properties soon after approval of the budget 2024-25. The SRO (Statutory Regulatory Order (SRO) will be issued in July 2024 and it raise the FBR’s valuation rates from the existing 75 percent to 90 percent of the rate at least“

Senator Sarmad Ali asked the government to abolish 10 percent GST on newsprint and argued that the media industry was already facing a difficult situation so it should be withdrawn.

The Senate panel recommended abolishing 10 percent GST on newsprint.

The FBR’s Member said that the FBR was making efforts to broaden the tax base and added 1.5 million new tax filers in the outgoing fiscal year. Senator Anusha Rahman stated that without drastic measures the tax filers would not increase and proposed to put non filers behind the bars. The FBR informed that the numbers of tax filers stood at around 4.5 million but the Senator Farooq H Naek and other inquired that how many were nil- filers. There would be more than 30 percent who will be zero filers but the FBR high-ups preferred not to share any exact numbers of nil filers.

The FBR officials said that the tax machinery unearthed Rs 756 billion of alleged tax frauds in shape of fake/flying invoices and arrested 70/80 persons. The steel sector, he said, was allegedly was one of the major sources of fake/flying invoices and scrap of steel was being used to run the business of fake invoices causing major losses of Rs 60-70 billion to the national exchequer on annual basis.

Senator Anusha Rahman belonging to PML (N) raised question that why FBR failed to collect taxes from a retail shop located in Model Town Lahore and cited example that the small shopkeeper collected the tax from her but the FBR failed to bring it into national kitty.

Both the FBR Member IRS Operation and Member Policy replied back that the FBR was facing severe Human Resource (HR) constraints as out of 18,000 sanctioned posts, the existing workforce stood at 12,000 and 6000 posts were vacant. “We need help to fill the vacant posts” said the FBR Member IR Operation.

Chairman of the Senate Standing Committee on Finance Saleem Mandviwala said on Friday that the FBR has done nothing during the last twelve years to document the sectors that are out of tax net.

He remarked that “we have been hearing for the last 12 years that FBR is doing this and that to bring the undocumented sectors into to the tax net but the fact of the matter is that it has done nothing”. Farooq H Naek said that FBR has been serving the income tax notices only to those who are already paying taxes.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2024