Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) Chairman Salman Siddique along with his senior tax officials visited Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) on Saturday and held a meeting with FPCCI’s members under the Chairmanship of FPCCI Acting President Dawood Usman Jakhura.
Participants in the meeting included Tariq Sayeed, Vice President CACCI and Former President FPCCI and SAARC CCI, Usman Sheikh Vice President-FPCCI; Shakeel Ahmed Dingra Mian Zahid Hussain, Mansha Churra, Zubair Tufail, Former Vice Presidents FPCCI Ibrahim Panwala, Nasir uddin Sheikh, Shaukat Ahmed, Abdul Hafeez Muhammad and Siddiq Sheikh.
Jakhura welcomed the FBR Chairman and his team and appreciated his initiative to interact with FPCCI in order to meet budget targets under difficult conditions. He urged that a mechanism for refund of sales tax paid on import of machinery be devised as soon as possible. He also stressed the implementation of Afghan Pakistan Transit trade agreement. CACCI Vice President Tariq Sayeed highlighted the problems being faced by importers due to raid on their cargos during transportation from Karachi to other parts of the country.
He also proposed that sales tax and income tax matters should be dealt by a separate head at FBR. He urged that sales tax on import of machinery be removed in order to industrialize the country. Shakil Ahmed Dhingra, Chairman Liaison with FBR discussed various policy matters. For instance the removal of section 8a from sales tax act as section 3aa binds the buyers to pay the amount of goods as well as sales tax to the buyer. He also commented on SRO 283 to bring one rate of five per cent without conditions within the scope of 5 export oriented industries.
He said that if such goods are sold to unregistered buyers he has to pay five per cent sales tax and it is not possible to charge 16 per cent from registered buyers. He also reiterated that the already taken decision on section 81 of Customs Act which says that if the provisional assessment is not decided within 90 days the declaration of importers becomes final. Moreover, the participants of FPCCI discussed policy matters related to the denial of input sales tax refund, allowing time limit to sales tax officials, allowing revising of sales tax return without permission of the sales tax authority, separation of tax judicial system from administration, levy of income tax after excluding sales tax and federal excise etc.
FBR Chairman Salman Siddique thanked the business community for extending cooperation in payment of their tax liability and enabling FBR to surpass the tax target. He agreed on levying sales tax at the rate of five percent on local sales for the five zero-rated industries.
