ISLAMABAD: The Federal Board of Revenue would have to collect enhanced revenue collection target of Rs4.435 trillion as Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi rejected the finance ministry’s proposal to lower next fiscal year’s proposed tax collection target to Rs4.3 trillion.
According to a media report quoting sources in PM’s Office, FBR Chairman Tariq Pasha was insisting that the target be set at Rs4.3 trillion – about Rs135 billion less than PM’s desire.
It is first time that an FBR chairman accepted the government’s approved tax collection target at the start of the fiscal year. Pasha is said to have informed the PM that the macroeconomic conditions and other factors including reduction in income tax rates for individuals would make it impossible to achieve the Rs4.435 trillion.
The sources said that Pasha at one point stated that if the target was not set at Rs4.3 trillion, he will opt out. Upon this, the sources said, PM Abbasi said that the target will remain unchanged.
While Pasha was seeking reduction in his tax collection target, Planning Secretary Shoaib Siddiqui kept pushing his case for increase in federal development budget from finance ministry proposed Rs750 billion to Rs1.3 trillion, said the officials. Although Pasha could not get his target cut, Siddiqui won a bonanza of Rs50 billion and PM increased the budget to Rs800 billion, the sources said.
