State hostage to unaccountables
IN the year 2019 Imran Khan paid Rs 9.9 m income tax, excluding the tax on agricultural income, which equalled to 22.7% of his declared income of Rs 43.6 m. The Premier is the 10th highest taxpayer among the 392 members of Parliament. He had paid only Rs 282,449 tax in 2018.
He declared Rs 38.9 million as normal income, Rs 2.3 million income under the fixed tax regime and another Rs 2.4 million as agri- income. Excluding the agri- income, Imran’s effective tax rate came to 24%. In 2019. The 392 MNAs and the Senators declared a cumulative income of Rs 11 billion but they paid a mere Rs 576 million in taxes.
The parliamentarians paid just 5.2% of their income far lower than the standard maximum tax rate of 35% for a salaried person. Out of 446 MNAs and the Senators, 392 filed the returns with the FBR.
These 392 legislators paid a cumulative sum of Rs 576 million in taxes against Rs 800 million in the year before showing a decline of 28%. As many as 54 parliamentarians did not submit their income tax returns for tax year 2019. None was questioned and held accountable either by Parliament or the FBR.
Only 80 senators paid Rs 169 million in taxes on the cumulative income of Rs 1.5 billion, bringing the average tax rate for the members of the Upper House of Parliament to 11%. Mere 312 MNAs paid Rs 408 million in taxes on their cumulative annual income of Rs 9.5 billion in 2019, paying just 4.3% of their income in taxes.
The 392 lawmakers had declared a cumulative sum of Rs 625 million as their agriculture income in 2019. Province-wise, 44 members of the Balochistan Assembly paid Rs 58.3 million in taxes on Rs 944 million income at an average rate of 6.2%. The 91 members of the KP Assembly paid Rs 30 million in taxes on the income of Rs 720 million, just 4.2% of their declared income.
The 327 members of the Punjab Assembly declared Rs 3 billion in income and paid Rs 231 million tax, bringing their average tax rate to 7.7%. The 149 members of the Sindh Assembly paid Rs 82.5 million in taxes on Rs1.8 billion income, bringing the average tax rate to 4.6%. When the members of the four provincial assemblies are added to the list, the data showed that 1,003 lawmakers paid less than Rs 1 billion in taxes on the cumulative income of Rs 17.5 billion.
The average tax rate came to a mere 5.5% for all of them. This shows that there is a huge income-tax gap that the FBR is leaving unplugged.
Usman Buzdar paid a meagre sum of Rs 2,000 tax on Rs 938,858 normal income at the rate of 0.2%. He is the fittest case for audit and accountability because the effective tax rate of 0.2% does not seem justifiable.
Murad Ali Shah paid Rs 1.1 million or 3.3% of his income of Rs 33.5 million, which also seems too low. Murad Ali Shah also declared another sum of Rs 24.2 million as agriculture income on which he might have paid tax in the province.
After adding agriculture income, his total income for 2019 came to Rs 57.7 million. Mahmood Khan, CM KP, paid Rs 66,258 on Rs 2.5 million income, bringing his effective rate to mere 2.6%, while Abdul Quddus Bizenjo CM Baluchistan paid Rs 1.1 million tax on Rs 7.9 million tax at 13.5% tax rate.
Asif Zardari paid Rs 2.2 million or 1.5% of his regular annual income of Rs 146.6 million. Including agriculture based income, Zardari’s total annual income remained Rs 282 million.
Pakistan has reached the highest level of inflation in the past 74 years. During over three and half years’ tenure PTI has seen 31% decline in foreign investment. The mismanagement and delay in the import of LNG, sugar, and wheat has cost the country at least Rs 550 billion in losses.
In the presence of highly qualified and experienced politicians and bureaucrats how billions of rupees are lost in ashes? None is questioned and held accountable. Where is the State infrastructure and mechanisms? The country will never sense its comfort zone unless heavy taxes are collected from the brutal privileged class.
Will all the responsible ever be held accountable? Who is responsible for unbearable loss of national exchequer? Isn’t it dishonesty and corruption? Will the State helplessly remain hostage to such unaccountables? Will the honourable courts not question and hold the malafieds accountable?
—The writer is editor, book ambassador, political analyst and author of several books based in Islamabad.
