KARACHI: Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has amended laws to restrain directorate general of internal audit from issuing notices to taxpayers for providing information including bank information, wealth statement and annual returns.
The FBR issued SRO 1071(I)/2017 to amend SRO 660(I)/2005 and deleted the paragraph related to powers of the directorate for issuing such notices.
The amendment has been made on the issue raised by Karachi Tax Bar Association (KTBA) through a letter sent to the FBR on August 15, 2017 regarding powers of office of the directorate general of internal audit.
Under Section 228 of the Income Tax Ordinance, 2001, Directorate General of Internal Audit has been established and through SRO 660(I)/2005 the jurisdiction and functions of the directorate were notified.
The tax bar pointed out that the taxpayers had approached the bar complaining that they were receiving notices from the directorate requiring information which they had already filed online at the time of their tax returns or filed with field officers during proceedings by the authorities.
The tax bar informed that these notices were creating unrest among already compliant taxpayers and mistrust between taxpayers and revenue authorities besides extra time and efforts needed by them for making compliance of notices.
The KTBA said that these information could not been directly asked by the office of the directorate from the taxpayers and the same could only be asked from the concerned officers holding jurisdiction.
The tax bar had also pointed out that in the past high-ups of the FBR had agreed to stop this exercise.
“We have against been informed by the members that the notices are still being issued by the directorate to taxpayers seeking information for last five years such as returns, wealth statements, complete bank statements etc.,” the KTBA said in the letter.
The KTBA had urged the FBR to issue necessary instructions to the directorate to approach respective filed offices to obtain information of taxpayers for the purpose of inspection/investigation and not to issue notices directly to already compliant taxpayers.
