Trading community has rejected increase in tax on the commercial buildings by the provincial government and termed it unbearable and vowed not to accept in any circumstances. The meeting held here at Peshawar Chamber of Small Traders and Industries (PCSTI) with its president, Atif Haleem in the chair was also unanimous in resistance to the tax and also hinted at moving court against it. They also called for introduction of fair rates of commercial rates before its collection.
Others who attended the meeting included Mohammad Adnan Jailil, Luqman Shah, Shakeel Saraf and some owners of the commercial buildings in the provincial metropolis. The participants of the meeting termed the increase that is nearly 200% tantamount to attack on the business community and asked the provincial government for avoiding unjustified double taxation. They instead of uniform tax called for the imposition of floor-wise property tax on commercial buildings and exempting of empty buildings.
A participant of the meeting complained that Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) is not adjusting the provincial tax and called for the handover of its collection to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Revenue Authority (KPRA) to share its inputs with the national tax collecting authority to make it adjustable.
According to a charter of demand distributed among the participants of the meeting, the Excise and Taxation Department is charging excise tax on corridors, pathways, mosque, free parking area, stairs, elevators, open areas, stairways and bathrooms. Furthermore, they complained that Excise Department, especially Excise and Taxation Officer (ETO) does not issue tax challan to avail the facility of 10% rebate. The participants called for the exemption of the utilities' areas of tax and issuance of tax challan latest by July 15 of each fiscal year.
It said that the Excise Department has already bi-furcated its act into two categories of residential and commercial and there is no point of charging the tax on the basis of rental value as the properties are already defined as commercial. They said that in the Finance Act, 2019, the provincial government has increased the commercial tax from Rs13 to Rs39 on A1 category and in the similar way in other categories and demanded of the provincial government to revise the rate and bring it back to the previous rates.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2019
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