Chambers of commerce and industry in Punjab would observe "Black Day" against the FBR Audit Policy 2016 after Rabi-ul-Awwal while black flags would also be hoisted on their buildings. This decision was taken during a meeting convened by the Lahore Chamber of Commerce & Industry on Wednesday.
LCCI President Abdul Basit presided over the meeting while the representatives of Gujranwala Chamber, Khanewal Chamber, Gujrat Chamber, Jhelum Chamber, Women Chamber, Lahore Tax Bar Association, Pakistan Petrochemical and Chemicals Association, Pakistan Association of Printing & Graphic Art Industry also spoke on the occasion and shared their point of view on the FBR Audit Policy 2016.
The participants said the FBR has kept them in complete darkness on Audit Policy 2016 and did not bother to take stakeholders on board in this regard. LCCI president said that FBR has recently approved Audit Policy 2016 without taking the private sector in confidence. This policy would allow FBR to select already audited taxpayers for re-audit which is by no means acceptable to the business people. He feared that it would become much easy for tax officials to harass the genuine taxpayers.
LCCI has already proposed to the government to exempt the already audited taxpayers for at least three years. He said the FBR has taken the plea that this step would improve Tax-to-GDP ratio which we seriously doubt. Pakistan has one of the lowest Tax-to-GDP ratio in the world and this policy can no way serve the purpose of broadening the tax base.
Presidents of Gujranwala, Gujrat and Khanewal Chambers assured their support to LCCI president in larger interests of country's economy. They called for identification of audit parameters and said that retailers, wholesalers, manufacturers and individuals should be treated separately. The participants were of the view that the business community already has a lot of reservations on misuse of discretionary powers by the tax officials while Audit Policy 2016 would give them more opportunities to harass the businessmen.
They said that public-private working relationship will get further deteriorated. They said that by approving such policies, the government is further squeezing the existing taxpayers instead of including new sectors into tax net. They were of the view that before bringing any major policy change that affects the business community, the FBR should positively take all the stakeholders on board so that practicable policies may be chalked out keeping in view the prevailing ground realities.
They also opposed the raids on business premises under section 38-B, business account attachments and undue checking of trading goods. They asked the Federal Board of Revenue to give relief to the business community and take them on board on trade & industry related issues otherwise FBR would not be able to meet its revenue targets until and unless business community is not taken on board.