Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) Large Taxpayer Office Karachi for the first time crossed one trillion benchmark of half-yearly collection by incurring taxes amounting to Rs.1221 billion during July to December 2023. In the first six months of fiscal year 2023-24, tax collection surpassed the target of Rs.1216 billion and registered a growth of 26.79% over the corresponding period of FY22-23 in which tax collection stood at Rs.963 billion, Commissioner Inland Revenue LTO Karachi, Girdhari Mal informed while briefing the media on Wednesday. He said that target was achieved despite nominal growth on imports at 2.5 % and as such substantial growth of 47 % has been achieved in domestic taxes.
He expressed optimism that LTO will achieve tax collection of over Rs.2.5 trillion in the current fiscal year 2023-24 as economic indicators including GDP growth, currency stabilization, foreign trade, current account, revenue generation and inflation expectations were showing improvement along with boom in stock market.
The indicators suggest that “economic slump is converting into economic recovery,” he said. He vowed that FBR was striving to contribute in government’s efforts for steering out of economic woes. He said that H1FY 2023-24 tax collection witnessed positive growth in banking, cotton ginning, electric and electronics, FMCGs. insurance, pharmaceutical, software and shipping sectors while automobile and auto parts, construction and oil exploration sectors remained in negative zone.
Another benchmark of Rs 300 billion was reached in monthly tax collection of December 2023 as LTO generated taxes of Rs.320 b against the assigned target of Rs.316 b, he stated adding that it depicted 39% increase as compared to Rs.230 billion collection of December 2022. Refund of Rs.75 billion were issued during H1FY23-24 with 103% increase over previous year’s Rs.36 billion while the volume of Advance taxes increased from Rs.230 billion of H1FY22-23 to Rs.385 billion collected in six months of current fiscal year, he said. LTO has conducted an in-depth analysis of tax at domestic and import stages while collection ratio from direct taxes and non-withholding taxes improved as well, he added. Sharing details of cases under litigation, the Commissioner IR said that there were 1019 cases for hearing in the apex court involving an amount of Rs.38 billion, 2408 cases in high courts involving disputed amount of Rs.331 billion while Tax Tribunals were hearing 4787 cases having accumulated tax amount over Rs.1121 billion. Responding to a query, he said that FBR has initiated automation process in 1996 and it has passed through gradual improvements and now most of the processes in FBR has been automated.
On another query, he said efforts were under way for tax compliance and filling as it was observed that there were a certain number of people who were carrying out substantial transactions but they were non-filer. He added that action is being taken to stop provision of certain facilities to them and their phone sims could be blocked.
