“Our tax machinery is unfortunately corrupted, really corrupted,” said Prime Minister Imran Khan during a conversation with digital media publishers here in Islamabad.
Answering a question by ProPakistani on tax reforms, he pointed out that the solution to this is automation, which the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) “has actively barred in the past.”
He said that out of 220 million people in Pakistan, only 3,000 pay 70 percent taxes. “Half of the taxes we [the government] collect go in debt settlement of loans taken by previous governments,” he said, adding that only 2 million people are tax filers.
“3.5 crore people in Pakistan have houses and cars, but they don’t pay taxes,” he said. Further adding, “We are now moving towards automation to resolve this issue. The massive external debt coupled with the responsibility to employ a huge young generation will not be possible without it.”
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It was reported that the filing of income tax returns (ITRs) has improved significantly during the tax year 2020, according to a statement issued by the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR).
The statement read, “Around 1.768 million taxpayers filed their income tax returns before the deadline, i.e., December 8, 2020, while revenue received by FBR stood at Rs. 22 billion by this date.”
The number of filers has further increased to 2.316 million along with the tax collection rising up to Rs. 43.6 billion till January 4, 2021, as compared to 2.181 million filers along with the tax collection of Rs. 28 billion during the corresponding period of the previous year, showing an increase of 55 percent in tax collection in the current year, it added.
FBR’s revenue collection has crossed Rs. 2205 billion during the first six months (July-December) 2020-21. The FBR has collected net revenue of over Rs. 2205 billion, which is over 99.7 percent of its six-monthly target of Rs. 2210 billion for the current Fiscal Year from July to December.
