Pakistan Tanners Association's (PTA) South Zone chapter's chairman Hamid A Zahoor has said that all the previous governments in Pakistan had made no serious efforts to find out alternative sources of revenue or to broaden the tax base.
Commenting on National Assembly Standing Committee's move of giving legal cover to the Rs 95 billion revenue collection target by approving the Gas Infrastructure Development Cess (GIDC) Amended Bill, 2014, he said that the industry had already rejected the NA's act of granting legal cover to the GIDC to be recovered from the industrial sector, in particular.
Criticising the government for not taking action against those living luxurious life in the country without paying any tax, he said that it was beyond one's comprehension that why the government was bent upon imposing GICD on the industry which was already heavily burdened with numerous taxes.
Hamid demanded of the government to find out alternative sources of income, instead of levying taxes on consumers to generate funds for a number of gas-related projects such as Iran-Pakistan Gas Pipeline Project, Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) Pipeline Project and LNG import and LPG supply enhancement projects.