FBR to introduce simple form for filing income tax returns: chairman

ISLAMABAD: Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) Chairman Javed Ghani said that the FBR was making efforts to develop permanent and simple form for filing of income tax returns, pursuing reforms for next six months and trying to resolve pending litigation before superior judiciary on priority basis in order to recover billions of rupees taxes.

The newly appointed FBR Chairman Javed Ghani on Tuesday called on Speaker National Assembly Asad Qaiser and discussed possibilities of ensuring foolproof arrangements at bordering areas for smooth functioning of clearance of containers. In the aftermath of outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic the bordering areas witnessed stuck up containers but now the FBR was asking the authorities to increase number of human resource in order to clear the backlog.

When this scribe contacted to Javed Ghani and inquired him about purpose of his meeting with NA Speaker, he said that he made courtesy call to the NA Speaker after assuming his charge. The Speaker NA raised the issue of stuck up containers at bordering areas. The FBR chairman assured him that the FBR would take all out steps to resolve this issue.

The FBR chairman said that he would also meet Senate chairman for seeking guidance on undertaking reforms into the FBR. He said that the FBR would convene Commissioners’ conference in order to build up good team for achieving challenging tax collection target in the current fiscal year.

He said that the efforts were underway to develop permanent simple form of income tax returns in order to avoid delays and repeated extensions in filing of returns. The proposed forms of income tax returns uploaded and then suggestions were invited. The FBR chairman said that they were discussing with Inland Revenue (IR) officers to develop permanent form and if required proper legislation changes could also be introduced so that delays in filing of income tax returns could be avoided.

He said that he assigned Member IRS and Member Customs operations to finalise monthly/quarterly targets with special focus on first quarter by taking into account of COVID-19 pandemic so that effective strategy could be devised to achieve the desired goal. Both these members operations, he said, finalised numbers and strategies and it would be shared with the field offices soon.

He said that he also held meeting with Attorney General in order to reduce number of pending cases involving billions of rupees into courts. He said that the reforms would be pursued as Dr Ishrat Hussain was supervising timelines for undertaking reforms on account of bringing automation and digitalisation into tax machinery. He said that the transparency would be ensured into tax collection machinery for maximising efficiency, fair play and equitable taxation.