Prime Minister Imran Khan said on Wednesday that taxpayers are true VIPs of the country and the government must honour them. Addressing a ceremony held to award appreciation certificates to 150 top taxpayers of the country, Prime Minister Imran Khan said that there is a need to change the mindset under which wealth creation is considered a sin so that people could be encouraged to invest in Pakistan.
For people who don''''t pay their taxes, the Prime Minister said they should keep in mind that there would be no hope to improve the country''''s economic situation unless they pay taxes. The Prime Minister regretted that Pakistan simply cannot prosper with just 1.7 million people filing taxes in a country of 210 million. As a result of this disparity, Khan said, the government is forced to impose indirect taxes on the common people who often cannot bear this burden, he added.
He noted that only 72,000 people from across the country declared annual income of over Rs 200,000, but added that it is understandable if the people shied away from paying taxes it is because of their concern that their money would not be fully utilised for the uplift of the lower segments of society. Khan stated that Pakistan has not adopted the modern concepts from the State of Medina, the most important element of which, he added, was the collection of Zakat from the affluent which was then spent on the welfare of the masses.
"It is my mission to tax those people in Pakistan whose luxurious lifestyles do not match with the amounts of taxes they pay," the Prime Minister Khan said, stressing that he does not believe in raising the tax rates but prefers widening the tax net. The Premier said his government had adopted austerity measures itself first, with all ministries were directed to cut their expenditures by 10 percent. "I have reduced expenditures of Prime Minister''''s House by 30pc ... saving Rs150 million so far," he stated.
He regretted that on one hand there are not enough medical facilities for the poor in the country while on the other, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, his family members and other PML-N leaders tend to go abroad for their medical treatment. "Taxpayers'''' money is not for our personal indulgence," the Premier said, assuring the people that their money would be spent on their own welfare. He said the government is making efforts to develop a tax-paying culture through reforms in the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) and moving towards e-governance to minimise the interaction between the tax collector and the taxpayer.
Once the system is fixed, the Prime Minister hoped, the country''''s annual tax revenue would rise to Rs 8 trillion from a current Rs 4.5 trillion. Earlier, Finance Minister Asad Umar stated that the tax which the government collects annually is simply not enough to run the affairs of the country and that other economies of a similar size collect more taxes than Pakistan.
He said the first measure in the drive to increase the tax-to-GDP ratio should be making it easy for people to pay taxes. The minister pointed out that all of FBR''''s laws are in English, a language understood by only a small minority in the country. Additionally, he said, the gathering of information by FBR should be technology-based and people should be asked only the most essential questions. The second step should be making it impossible for people who do not pay taxes to "find a place to hide".
There is no need to run after hundreds of thousands of people for this, [just] catch the big fish and the message will automatically reach down to the masses, the minister advised the revenue authorities. Thirdly, he said it is a right of the Pakistani taxpayers that their money is spent only on the welfare of the country. "That money cannot be used to build properties in London, or to stash in banks of Switzerland, or to erect towers in Dubai," he said.
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