Federal Board of Revenue has collected Rs. 200 billion in taxes this month, indicating a great start to the new fiscal year 2017-18 by exceeding the monthly target.
Last year, Rs. 164 billion were collected during the same month, about 22% less than the current amount.
“We have achieved the target of Rs. 200 billion for July 2017” an official of FBR stated.
Tax collection by FBR had crossed the Rs. 183 billion mark by yesterday noon.
“The collection of over Rs. 200 billion shows that the tax machinery did not collect advance tax in abundance in June 2017, the last month of the previous fiscal year,” he added.
The revenue collection target has been estimated at Rs. 4,013 billion by the government for fiscal year 2017-18, with direct taxes standing at Rs. 1,594.91 billion and Rs. 2,418.09 billion under indirect taxes.
Projected revenue target of income tax was Rs. 1,577.557 billion, while tax targets for customs duty stood at Rs. 581.371 billion, sales tax at Rs. 1605.2 billion and Federal Excise Duty at Rs. 231.519 billion for the ongoing financial year.
An FBR official stated:
The FBR’s reconciled tax collection stood at Rs. 3,360 billion in accordance with AGPR and SBP data instead of the revised tax collection target of Rs. 3,521 billion so achieving the tax collection target of Rs. 4,013 billion simply seems unfeasible.
To reach the target of Rs. 4,013 billion, FBR has to see a growth of 19.4%, especially considering how the last fiscal year’s target was missed by a huge margin of Rs. 261 billion.
The FBR is scheduled to meet and brief the Senate Committee on Finance, Revenue, Economic Affairs, Statistics and Privatization on Wednesday about the revenue collection achieved during 2016-17, its targets for 2017-18 and the rules made under the Benami Act 2017.
The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) will brief the committee on the recent depreciation of Pakistani rupee against the dollar and its effect on the economy. Central bank will also inform the committee about its role in the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) on the Panama case.
