Out of 260,000 manufacturers, only 42,000 registered with FBR

ISLAMABAD: Under the National Transformation Plan approved by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has decided to take strict action against tax defaulters and short-filers. The plan will not spare any tax defaulter or corrupt FBR official.

FBR Member Saeed Akram, while giving the latest FBR statistics, told this correspondent that despite the approval of 1,100 vehicles of 1300cc, vehicles of 1199cc are being given. The letter of intent that has been agreed with the vehicle manufacturer states that these 1,010 new vehicles would be for Inland Revenue Service, Customs Service, Customs Collectorate, Sales Tax Formation, Federal Excise Duty and Income Tax Formation across the country. They would be used by the auditors, income tax inspectors, superintendents, appraisers and BPS-18 officers to apprehend evaders of Customs Duty, Sales Tax, Income Tax and Federal Excise Duty.

It has been decided to build a central control room at the FBR headquarters. A tracker would be installed in each vehicle to track and monitor it in the control room. The FBR member also said that the total cost of these vehicles would be Rs4.7 billion which will be taken from the transformation fund approved by the prime minister.

He said that in the latest data of FBR, it is stated that the population of Pakistan is 23.5 million. Out of this, 6.70 million people are earners. Only 2.5 million to 3 million Pakistanis are registered in the tax regime. There are 260,000 manufacturers in Pakistan who are making their own goods. Out of those, only 42,000 are registered in the sales tax regime.

The prime minister has made a plan to trace 218,000 unregistered manufacturers through digital entry. He said that more Rs3.5 trillion would be collected though there is a potential to collect Rs6 trillion more tax.