The Federation of Pakistan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) on Tuesday demanded to impose income tax on sectors enjoying unjust exemptions in the upcoming budget. We will have no future sans effective governance, transparent reforms and easily comprehensible taxation regime, it said.
Tax regime should be balanced as presently the business community and salaried class is bearing the entire burden while many sectors are exempted which is a hurdle in the national development, said Mirza Abdul Rehman, VP, FPCCI while speaking to business community. Flanked by Chairman Media FPCCI Malik Sohail and other business leaders, he said that we are pinning high hopes on Finance Minister who has promised a friendly budget. Country will remain dependent on foreign aid unless all the sectors, especially agriculture, and defaulters are brought into tax net, he observed. Sales tax and mark-up be brought to single digit to accelerate growth, said Mirza Abdul Rehman.
He said that all the duties on import of pharmaceutical machinery and raw materials should be waived to give a boost to the local industry and enable it to compete with other countries in the global market.
Energy scarcity has crippled the economy which should be taken as challenge in the next fiscal otherwise its impact on masses and economy will become unendurable, the business leader warned.
He said that government should reduce non-developmental expenditure and start building Kalabagh dam to resolve energy crisis and tackle rising unemployment. At the occasion, Malik Sohail said that whole nation is looking towards the parliament for a road map for economic recovery. Some quarters are uneasy over lack of any serious debate in the parliament on the nation’s economic woes, he said. Developed nations spend a substantial part of their parliamentary year debating their economic and budget plans while here everything is left to bureaucracy which is root cause of many problems, he said. Malik Sohail supported the demanded by former president FPCCI Iftikhar Ali Malik to slap a ban on import of used cars to encouraged local industry.