LAHORE: Pakistan can surely get rid of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) if the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has all the required resources to collect taxes. This was stated by Assistant Commissioner Zone-V, Regional Tax Office-II (RTO-II) Syed Nasir Jamal Shah during an exclusive interview with Customs Today.
Syed Nasir Jamal said that there is an acute shortage of the staff in Inland Revenue Service (IRS). If all issues faced by the FBR are addressed, the department has the potential to collect double income from the last year. He added that during last year, FBR collected Rs 3.1 trillion and if all resources are available, the board can collect Rs 6 trillion in a year. In that case, Pakistan will not look towards the IMF to overcome its budgetary deficit.
Nasir Jamal said that the tax collection throughout the country is improving because of collective efforts of the IRS officers. He emphasized for strengthening the tax authorities by legislative amendments and recruiting new staff members i.e. inspectors (IIR), clerical staff (steno typists, UDCs, LDCs) and armed guards.
He said that he is putting in more efforts for Broadening of Tax Base (BTB) and sales tax registration purely on merit basis. He told that to detect sales tax evasion, he conducts stock taking under section 38 of Sales Tax Act 1990. During this exercise, he along with his team finds many discrepancies and recovers sales tax from taxpayers. He said “I collected 20 million under the head of sales tax during the month of November through stock taking”. He said that Multan Road, Wapda Town and Johar Town falls under his jurisdiction to collect taxes.
Nasir Jamal told that he detected that a renowned departmental store namely Rainbow Store as defaulter of sales tax. After necessary procedure he collect Rs1 million from Rainbow Store as sales tax.
He also recovered Rs70 million sales tax from M/s. Packages Private Limited. He also highlighted that Packages is Pakistan’s largest unit for manufacturing of paper, tissue and some other things. He conducted its stock taking for the first time since its establishment in 1956. He also detected Golden Green Valley a super store in Bahria Town and recovered Rs1 million as sales tax.
“I collected Rs7 million as an audit para which is a big achievement” Nasir told to Customs Today.
Answering the question, he said that he is working as focal person for Sales Tax Registration in Zone-V. He properly checks the status of taxpayers, and visits premises and ensures complete scrutiny to avoid fake and flying invoices.
He also ensures completion of documents of the people willing to get registered in sales tax. These documents include proof of bank accounts, rent agreements and utility bills.
Zone-V is on top in Sales Tax registration in the Regional Tax Office-II (RTO-II) due to the quick service delivery. Talking about himself, he is from 42nd common of Central Superior Service (CSS). He paid tributes to professional working style of his Additional Commissioner, Attiya Ali Khan and Commissioner Inland Revenue, Karamatullah Khan Chaudhary.
He appreciated the efforts of RTO II under the supervision of a Khawaja Adnan Zaheer for strengthening the writ of FBR which will yield results in terms of revenue in the longer run.
