LAHORE: A famous social media website facebook has told the Punjab Revenue Authority (PRA) that it did not need any kind of registration with the authority to pay sales tax, as they were operating from outside Pakistan.
“Registration with the PRA is not applicable to us as we aren’t taxable in the country. We are providing our online services from Ireland from where the multinational corporation is operating,” PRA officials said.
The PRA had sent notices to Facebook, Google, Dailymotion and YouTube about two months ago, asking them to get their online advertisement business registered with the Authority in the Punjab, Pakistan. However, only Facebook responded.
The officials said, “If Dailymotion, Google and YouTube did not respond, we will register these social media giants compulsorily under Section 27 of the PRA Act 2012.”
The officials said that currently the PRA had no enforcement powers, enabling it to take action against these tax-evading companies that didn’t exist in Pakistan physically.
They said the Authority had also decided to introduce new amendments to the existing laws to empower the PRA to block such sites/ companies in Pakistan with the PTA’s help.
