Fiscal Year 2015 revenue collection to be around Rs 2.65 trillion: National Assembly panel told

The revenue collection of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) would be between Rs 2,600 billion and Rs 2,650 billion for the whole fiscal of 2014-15. Senior Member Policy Inland Revenue Shahid Hussain Asad informed the sub-committee of National Assembly Standing Committee on Finance that the FBR would be able to collect nearly Rs 2,650 billion by the end of current fiscal year.
The budgetary revenue projection of the FBR was Rs 2,810 billion for 2014-15 which has been reduced to Rs 2,691 billion. The tax collection during July-March 2014-15 stood at Rs 1,775 billion. When the committee members asked about the FBR strategy to collect Rs 916 billion in last three months (April-June) 2014-15, the Senior Member said the FBR is making serious efforts to meet the assigned revenue collection target by the end of current fiscal year.
Asad was confident that the assigned target would be met through a well-defined strategy being implemented in the last quarter of 2014-15. Responding to a query, he said the GIDC is not part of the FBR's revenue collection. The decrease in prices of petroleum products and commodities has negative impact of sales tax collection during 2014-15 Shahid Hussain Asad said that the FBR is surrendering its powers to the ECC of the Cabinet for issuing SROs to grant any exemption or tax concession. Following surrendering the powers, the Economic Co-ordination Committee of the Cabinet would be the ultimate authority to approve exemption of duties and taxes. The FBR would not have any authority to issue exemptions through the SROs, he added.
The FBR Senior Member Tax Policy stated that the difference of tax rates between filers and non-filers would be further increased in the coming budget (2015-16) keeping in view successful experience of imposing higher rate of withholding tax on non-compliant persons. It was the right policy decision and results are visible. He said the difference of tax rates between the filers and non-filers has resulted in increase of 20 percent in direct taxes collection during July-March (2014-15). There is an impact of 20 percent on the overall direct taxes collection due to higher rates of withholding taxes on non-filers of income tax returns.
Muhammad Ashraf Khan, FBR Member IR Operations, said that the number of return filers has increased by 50,000 during current fiscal year due to difference of tax rates between filers and non-filers announced in budget (2014-15). Earlier, there was a nominal increase in number of return filers when the withholding tax rates for filers and non-filers remained the same.
Another major development is that the cost of non-filers of income tax returns has increased which has forced the non-compliant persons to come into the tax net. During the period of July-March of 2014-15, there is substantial increase in revenue following imposition of higher rates of withholding taxes on non-filers. According to estimate, there is increase of around Rs 4-5 billion in direct taxes collection due to additional cost on the non-filers, the FBR Member added.