Breaking all the previous records of sales tax collection at the import stage and local consumption, the Central Board of Revenue (CBR) has collected Rs 138.225 billion as sales tax against the target of Rs 124.6 billion during the first half of the current financial year, reflecting an increase of 10.9 percent. The CBR Directorate of Research and Statistics updated the data here on Thursday. The sales tax collection during the first two quarters of the current fiscal crossed Rs 138.225 billion against Rs 100.75 billion collected during the same period of the last year, reflecting a substantial growth of Rs 37.475 billion.
This growth has been mainly driven by the sales tax on imports as well as from domestic commodities.
The collection of Rs 138.225 billion as sales tax is Rs 30.925 billion higher than the provisional collection of Rs 107.3 billion issued on December 31, 2004.
Officials said that the CBR is making all-out efforts to meet the ambitious revenue collection targets set by the prime minister, including revenue collection, increase in sales tax registration, adjudication, appeals, enforcement measures to check non-filers, nil-filers and other areas.
The CBR is showing improvement on the general sales tax (GST) collection side despite the fact that the overall volume of refund has increased and the audit has been suspended for six months.
When asked why there is an impression that the GST collection from the domestic sources is less than the collection at the import stage, the officials said that the actual way to judge the GST collection at the domestic stage could be crystal clear from the value of taxable supplies; increase in value of taxable supplies, value of zero-rated supplies and value of total supplies.
These four parameters would act as important guidelines for judging the GST collection at the domestic stage. If there is increase in value of taxable supplies and value of zero-rated supplies, it simply reflects increase in the domestic GST collection.