KARACHI: The Sindh government collected Rs6 billion from stamp duty during the previous fiscal year against Rs4.6 billion last year.
However, the collection was Rs500 million less against the set target of Rs6.5 billion for 2013-14.
The data released by the Sindh Board of Revenue (SBR) shows that the highest amount of stamp duty, Rs872 million was recorded in January, followed by Rs513 million in May, Rs512m in November and Rs473m in June. On the other hand, the lowest level of revenue was observed in August (Rs281m), followed by Rs334 million in July.
An SBR spokesman said 60 per cent of the stamp duty revenue was contributed by the real estate sector followed by banking and insurance (13pc). The rest was generated from commercial documents, shares, contracts and customs documents.
He said the assessment powers given to the registrar at the city court have resulted in checking cases of under-invoicing of stamp value. However, a major source of revenue leakage is the sale of blank stamp papers to the lawyers and vendors.
The revenue board has shelved its plans to increase the value of properties listed in the Valuation Table by 20pc. The values in the table were raised by 200pc a few years ago.
However, the SBR has enforced stamp duty on transactions of open plots which is likely to generate considerable revenue as a major activity is witnessed these days in sale and purchase of plots.
A lot of revenue is leaked in stamp duty on Goods Declaration (GD) which is manually charged at the rate of Rs500 per document.
The SBR is negotiating with customs authorities for automated collection of stamp duty along with customs duty and other taxes through the automation system WeBOC (web-based one customs), but still there is no agreement between the customs and the revenue board.
