KARACHI: A tripartite Service Level Agreement (SLA) has been signed between the Board of Revenue, Sindh, Sindh Bank Limited, and Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB) for issuance of e-Stamps by Sindh Bank Limited to facilitate people of the province in obtaining the stamps.

The SLA will enable the Sindh Bank to receive payments against online challan 32-A and issue e-Stamps at its designated branches throughout Sindh, said an official statement.

The e-Stamping system was formally inaugurated by Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on May 10, 2022 and the service was initially launched from the designated branches of National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) across Sindh. After the signing of SLA with Sindh Bank, people will be able to obtain e-Stamps from their nearest branches of Sindh Bank while NBP will also continue to issue them.

“The world has entered a new age and we are leaving no stone unturned to strengthen our institutions to keep pace with the world. E-Stamping is an effort in that direction,” said the provincial minister for revenue, Makhdoom Mehboob-uz-Zaman, while presiding over proceedings of the launch event.

“Well-being of the people of Sindh is at the heart of all policies of Sindh government, which is determined to implement citizen-centric policies to improve the lives of people and the e-Stamping initiative of the Board of Revenue, Sindh, is aligned to achieve this goal,” he said.

“The issuance of e-Stamps from Sindh Bank will help in alleviating the burden on NBP branches and achieve the objective of facilitating people by expediting the issuance of e-Stamps,” the minister added.

The president and CEO of Sindh Bank, Imran Samad, expressed the resolve of his bank to meet the expectations of Sindh government regarding e-Stamping.

Senior Member of the Board of Revenue, Sindh, Baqaullah Unnar, Member of Reforms Wing and Special Cell Syed Ahmed Ali Shah, Member (RS&EP) Dr Waseem Shamshad Ali, Chief Inspector of Stamps Ghulam Abbas Naich, Project Director for Automation of Stamps and Registration Abdul Wajid Shaikh and functionaries of the Sindh Bank, PITB and others were present on the occasion.

The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has approved Sindh Bank as its agent for the collection of government receipts and recently an agency agreement was signed with the bank.

The E-Stamping system envisages online generation and printing of stamp duty challan from the e-Stamping portal (www.estamps.gos.pk) as well as the issuance of e-Stamp papers from the designated branches of Sindh Bank Limited and National Bank of Pakistan.

Based on the details entered by the purchaser, the system automatically calculates the value of the stamp paper. The names of the buyer, seller and the person from whom the stamp papers are purchased are entered along with their CNIC numbers.