ISLAMABAD: The Model Customs Collectorate of Peshawar’s performance has shown decline due to levy of one percent Infrastructure Development Cess on imported items but this matter will be resolved soon between the Chamber of Commerce and the KP government.
The business of Peshawar dry port suffers due to Infrastructure Development Cess, and the business community is demanding that the said cess is already collected by the Sindh government and levy of the same tax by the KP government means double taxation.
This was stated by Chief Collector Sarwat Tahira Habib while giving an exclusive interview to Customs Today. Talking on the assessment of the performance of the Customs Northern Region for January 2016-17, she said the Customs Northern Region has been able to achieve the overall revenue target of January FY-2016-17 as it collected Rs2744.89 million against the assigned target of Rs2737.20 million which is 13% higher than the corresponding month of January 2015-16. He added that tax-wise collection also indicates growth in major taxes vis-à-vis target and collection during the corresponding period of last financial year 2015-16.
She said the North Region was assigned Rs1107 million under the head of Sales Tax for January FY 2016-17 and it was achieved with a collection of Rs1112.41 million by exceeding the collection. He further said the North Region also achieved its assigned target of Rs1006.22 million during January of financial year 2015-16.
The chief collector told Customs Today that North Region showed an increase of 25% under the head of withholding tax through collection of Rs599 million against the assigned target of Rs479 million for January FY-2016-17, saying the said collection was also 38% higher than the collection in the corresponding month of last financial year’s January 2015-16.
Chief Collector Sarwat Tahira said that under the head of Custom Duty despite closure of Sost Dry Port and decrease in clearances in bonds and dry ports in KP due to introduction of cess by the provincial government, overall collection of Customs Duty of Rs1010 million was 5% higher than the CD collection in the corresponding month of FY2015-16.
The chief collector has especially appreciated the efforts by the MCC Islamabad, Peshawar and Sambrial for their efforts for revenue collection. She stressed the need for maximizing the efforts for the overall collection/target achievement in the coming months. She believed that incoming months’ targets will be higher than the assigned collection targets during previous months (July to January) of current financial year 2016-17.
