Pakistan Tanners Association's (Southern Zone) Chairman Hamid A. Zahoor has urged the members of the parliament to declare Gas Infrastructure Development Cess (GIDC) null and void in its next session as it has already been termed illegal by the Supreme Court of Pakistan.
Lauding the parliament's gesture to defer the decision of extending Ordinance for continuing recovery of GIDC, he said that it was not justified as work on Pak-Iran-Turkmenistan and Afghanistan-Pakistan-India gas pipeline projects has not yet begun. Accusing the government of imposing GIDC merely to meet budget deficit, he said that the government had already increased Sales Tax by five per cent on petroleum products. He said that with the imposition of `unjustified' GICG not only the production cost, but even the cost of doing business have increased manifold.
Moreover, it was adversely affecting export-oriented industries, besides it would be difficult for the leather industry to compete in the global markets. He suggested that billions of rupees which had already been collected under the head of GIDC must be returned to the industries, or adjusted against their future bills of gas companies.