National Tax Reforms Commission meeting begins today

The two-day meeting of the National Tax Reforms Commission would start from December 15 (Monday) at the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) to discuss policy matters of income tax, sales tax, customs duty, anti-smuggling strategy and reforms in the tax administration.
Sources told Business Recorder here on Sunday that the meeting would start early morning at the FBR House and would continue till evening. The meeting would continue for two consecutive days ie December 15-16. FBR team of tax managers headed by Chairman, FBR Tariq Bajwa would make presentations on income tax, sales tax, administration and customs. It was agreed that presentations will be made by members of FBR including Member (Customs), Member (IR-Policy), Member (IR-Operations), Member (Administration) and D.G (I&I).
The Tax Reforms Commission constituted by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar would focus on six policy areas, ie, rates and modalities of sales tax collection, tariff reforms-protectionism vs trade liberalisation, functional vs circle-based jurisdictions in Inland Revenue, the FBR's autonomy, anti-smuggling enforcement capacity and effectiveness of the Alternate Dispute Resolution Mechanism.
Tax authorities have emphasised that reform has two aspects, ie, administrative and policy reforms and highlighted the key issues: Rates and Modalities of Sales Tax collection; Tariff Reforms - Protectionism Vs Trade Liberalisation; Functional Vs Circle Based jurisdictions in Inland Revenue; FBR's autonomy - Options and Impact; Anti-Smuggling - Enforcement Capacity Issues and Alternate Dispute Resolution Mechanism - Making it effective.
During last meeting, Chairman TRC Masood Naqvi, who made it clear that Commission will consider macro issues and will not take-up micro issues pertaining to specific taxpayers or group of taxpayers unless they have nexus with the macro issues.
It was agreed that all chambers will jointly hold their meetings and formulate joint proposals/recommendations. It was also decided that nominations from the bodies must be permanent and the same individual should represent his Organisation unless some other person expert in the specific area is required.
It was decided that all meetings of the Commission will be held at FBR (HQ) but exceptional meetings may also be held at Karachi or Lahore. The meeting may spread over one or two-days. Chairman FBR agreed to set-up a virtual office at FBR and one officer would be dedicated to look after the virtual office. Contact information including email IDs of members will be shared by that office.
The chairman of the Commission had informed the members that in order to move forward he would constitute Committees for a focused discussion on various components of TOR and asked Members to indicate to the Chairman about their interest in serving on any of the following Committees: Tax Policy; Direct Taxation; Indirect Taxation; Sales Tax and Excise Duty; Customs; Administrative Reforms and any other Committee.