Block ID Cards of Tax Defaulters: National Assembly Body

National Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) said on Tuesday that the ID cards of tax defaulter’s should be blocked. The committee also recommended that an article pertaining to this should be added to the new finance bill.

Additionally, the PAC also asked that the ID cards of those who don’t follow up on the tax defaulter cases should also be blocked. Fraudsters should not be forgiven, said the head of PAC. Sardar Ashiq Hussain Gopang at the National Assembly today.

New Laws Needed

During the National Assembly session, Chairman of Federal Board of Revenue Muhammad Irshad was also present. He said that separate legislation is required to block the ID cards as only the National Database and Registration Authority has the right to do so. He added,

If the PAC recommends it, we will include this as an article in the new finance bill.

PAC member Pervaiz Malik asked the FBR chairman whether they can block the ID cards for the owners of tax defaulting companies to which he replied that they do not have the authority. Malik added that recently a group from Faisalabad defaulted tax of up to Rs. 13 billion. He requested that in addition to the ID cards, the passports of the culprits should also be banned.

Pending Cases Worth Rs. 26.27 Billion

The matter was brought up after the PAC reviewed FBR’s Inland Revenue Audit Report 2013-2014 and discovered an amount of Rs. 169.74 billion unaccounted for. The report included details about 22 cases worth Rs. 26.27 billion pending in courts with the FBR managing to recover Rs. 20 billion so far.

Mr. Irshad said that the legal department needs reforms as well, He added that,

Lawyers taking up cases worth billions of rupees were being paid only Rs20,000 or Rs30,000 a month. The PAC can form legislation in the parliament in relation to the pending cases. In order to have the pending cases resolved as soon as possible, the judiciary should be contacted through the attorney general.

Talking to the PAC, Mr. Irshad said that PTCL, Southern Power, Liberty Power, Saba Power and Rosh Limited are some of the biggest tax defaulters right now.

Via Pakistan Today