Finance Minister Ishaq Dar has directed tax machinery to continue focusing on direct taxes to improve overall revenue collection of Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) and expanding the tax net with special focus on increasing the confidence of taxpayers. Sources told Business Recorder here on Saturday that minister was addressing the second day of the Chief Commissioners' Conference here at Federal Board of Revenue.
Dar highly appreciated the performance of FBR regarding achievement of assigned revenue collection target during the first month of the current fiscal year. He highlighted that excellent team has been selected for the FBR which is expected to continue to show good performance. He said that direct taxes are gradually growing during the last four years and trend should continue in 2017-18.
He stated that the tax officials should politely listen to the problems of the taxpayers. Special focus should be given on the broadening tax base as number of taxpayers has been increased from 700,000 in the past to over 1,200,000. The trend of increasing number of taxpayers should continue in 2017-18. He directed the FBR and chief commissioners to maintain ongoing positive trend of revenue collection in 2017-18. The finance minister wished success to the new team and hoped this visible change and trend would continue in the coming months.
On the issue of assigning revenue collection targets on quarterly basis, sources said that Ishaq Dar was optimist that the policy decision would be instrumental in proper planning for achievement of the targets set by chief commissioners of large taxpayer units and regional tax offices. Dar said that taxpayer's education and facilitation should be top priority of the FBR which would improve confidence of the taxpayers.