KARACHI: The constant delay in bringing a private aviation company to the book for evading huge amount in taxes and non-recovery of Rs76.54 million from the company has been making mockery of the law and setting a bad precedent, especially at a time when the country is grappling with severe economic challenges.
The authorities concerned have appeared to be ‘indifferent’ to take action against the private jet company for causing a huge loss of Rs76.54 million to national exchequer by evading Federal Excise Duty (FED), Sales Tax (ST) and Income Tax (IT) for tax years – 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010.
Although the Anti-Evasion Cell of Large Taxpayers Unit (LTU) Karachi initiated proceedings against the company, nothing came out of it. The Anti-Evasion Cell started the proceedings on the complaint of a private investigator Moin Mirza and had made a contravention case while issued a show cause notice to the company for evading FED, ST and IT that resulted in determination of tax liability of Rs76.54 million.
According to the available data, orders were passed against the taxpayer on October, 2012 but no recovery could be made so far. Ironically the authority concerned has appeared dilatory in taking action against the private jets company and transferred the case from LTU Karachi to Regional Tax Office (RTO), causing instead severe problems.
Currently the assessing officer has approached the RTO concerned with the request for the requisite record, but no such record has been received so far and the proceedings are still pending. It is to be noted that the Federal Tax Ombudsman (FTO) had also issued orders for the recovery of evaded taxes but no visible efforts could be made so far due to alleged “might” of the influential company.
