PESHAWAR, July 1: The sale of locally-made cars has dropped drastically as most of the buyers, who come here from the federal and provincial tribal territories, do not come within the purview of the national tax laws.

Franchisers said that the provision of the National Tax Number certificate for the purchase of new cars threw customers in a quandary as tax regimes do not apply to certain parts of the NWFP and adjacent tribal areas.

A notification issued by the Central Board of Revenue directed car manufacturers-cum-assemblers to sell new vehicles only to the NTN holders and provide record in this regard to the board or any other designated person on monthly basis.

For the first time the government made the provision of the NTN certificate compulsory for manufacturer-cum-assemblers which discourages buyers. The federal government has yet to extend the Income Tax Ordinance, 1979, to the tribal areas.

Under the Constitution, the president issues special notifications for extending tax laws to the Fata while the NWFP governor, with the special permission of the president, issues notification for PATA in this regard. Due to non-extension of tax laws to both these areas, local people use non-custom paid vehicles.

It was learnt that most of the potential buyers belonged to the Provincially-Administered Tribal Area and the Federally- Administered Tribal Area as these areas had been exempted from all sorts of taxes.

Authorised car dealers here said that the imposition of new CBR conditionalities had affected their business as a majority of their customers did not have NTN certificates.

A dealer said that since the issuance of the CBR notification, only two vehicles had been booked while many clients were withdrawing their orders due to non-availability of NTN certificates.

Statistics showed that there were only 24,000 NTN card holders in Peshawar district, including about 8,000 salaried employees. An official said that the CBR had issued around 12,000 temporary registration numbers in the district while some Afghan refugees were also among the NTN certificate holders.

The issue prompted the federal government and an official of the CBR, when approached by telephone in Islamabad, to say that the matter was under consideration and position would be clarified within the next few days.

The official said that apart from the tribal territories, farmers and overseas Pakistanis also did not have NTN certificates. However, he clarified that customers, who had booked new cars before June 12 were not required to submit NTN cards.

According to a CBR statement old NTN cards/certificates were still valid even if the date mentioned thereon had expired and the authorised dealers might accept such documents.