Ombudsman asks for tracking tax evasion

ISLAMABAD: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) lacks information technology-based tracking system and was recommended by the Federal Tax Ombudsman (FTO) to devise an institutional mechanism to follow-up in cases involving alleged evasion of billions of rupees in taxes.

An in-house analysis done by the office of FTO identified that the FBR’s field formations neither possessed an IT-based tracking system nor placed any institutional mechanism to follow-up for the cases that unearthed massive tax evasions. The FTO has unearthed a number of potential cases of tax evasion.

The FTO office took up one major case of M/s Hope 87 Pakistan. A detailed investigation report and case study was prepared after the case examination was confirmed and shared by the Directorate General (DG), Broadening of Tax Base (BTB) FBR.

This valuable information was duly shared in December 2018 with the concerned field formations for taking actions against these entities for not declaring true particulars of their receipts/income and not discharging their responsibilities as withholding agents.

However, in 2019 the FBR management suddenly shelved this whole BTB regime overnight; disbanding BTB Zones Islamabad, Lahore, and Karachi. The office of DG BTB was relegated to a ceremonial entity assigned as an additional charge.

Thus, in addition to losing an effective organisation, the repository of the whole abovedata/information was suddenly rendered extinct. The FTO’s investigation clearly established that information passed by DG BTB in December 2018 had neither been utilised before the intervention made by the office nor analysed vis-a-vis the ground position of the entity in question.

None of the field officers of FBR holding jurisdiction over the instant case during December 2018 and November 2021 was vigilant enough to initiate the action, which has been initiated after three years and that too after the intervention of the FTO Secretariat.