Faisalabad Electric Supply Company (FESCO) has directed its officials to issue power connections only to income tax return filers. A notification was circulated on Monday in this regard.
According to the directives, FESCO has asked its Superintending Engineers to ensure that all the applicants for commercial and industrial connections should be filers.
The power supplier has asked its Superintending Engineers to implement the Section 181 AA of Income Tax Ordinance-2001 in its true spirit. The law binds applicants for power connection to be an active return filer.
The order is aligned with the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR)’s policy to enhance the tax base. The revenue board had request the Power Minister Omar Ayub to ensure the implication of Section 181AA.
The new management of FBR, under its chairman Shabbar Zaidi, is working hard to improve the revenue collection in the country. Zaidi has taken several strict measures in this regard to bring more and more non-filers into the tax net.
As a result, the number of total tax filers in the country has increased to 2.5 million income tax returns for Tax Year 2019, a 47 percent growth in less than one year. In the fiscal year 2018, a total of 1.7 million returns were received.
