July 23, 2006	Sunday	Jumadi-ul-Sani 26, 1427

LAHORE, July 22: A national audit plan is being prepared with an objective to ensure that an efficient mechanism for tax audit is in place.

“We are presently engaged in developing the plan after studying the audit models in different countries of the world,” director general Large Taxpayers Unit (LTU), Lahore, Umar Farooq told journalists here on Saturday.

He said that the LTU had recently carried out a study on the supply and value chain of the cement sector to identify its real revenue potential, besides ensuring improvement in the quality of audit. A similar study would be done in the sugar sector in coming days.

He said that the base price of sugar for tax purpose as provided by Pakistan Sugar Mills Association had been Rs26 per kg. The stocks presently with the sugar mills, when sold would yield sales tax worth Rs1.25 billion.

He said that the quantity of sugar off-loaded by the sugar mills in the market this year was less as compared to the last year.

Responding to a question about electronic filing of returns, he said that there had been some problem with National Institutional Facilitation Technologies (NIFT), which had been sorted out, he added.—APP