PESHAWAR, Aug 8: Traders and shopkeepers doing business in cantonment areas prefer paying professional tax to cantonment boards instead of the NWFP government. They cite irrational tax ratio and maltreatment they were being subjected by the NWFP excise and taxation department (E&TD) as major reasons for their tilt towards the cantonment boards.

Markazi Tanzeem-i-Tajiran NWFP general-secretary Sharafat Ali Mubarik said that traders and shopkeepers in the Peshawar cantonment felt comfortable while paying professional tax to the cantonment board, although they had reservations over its collection from businessmen.

Mr Mubarik said the cantonment board charged the levy at a flat rate of Rs200 per shop annually, whereas the provincial government calculated the same on the basis of total number of employees working in a shop.

The secretary-general pointed out that the cantonment board had awarded the collection contract to a private firm whose officials were friendly with the shopkeepers because they operated in collaboration with the respective associations of markets and bazaars, while E&TD officials used to harass them.

He said that technically professional tax should be collected from professionals and working people and not from traders and shopkeepers.

Both the provincial government and the cantonment boards are at loggerheads with each other over the collection of professional tax.

Article 163 of the Constitution authorises the provincial government to collect professional tax from the cantonment areas falling in its territory.

However, an SRO of the ministry of defence issued on October 12, 2004, empowered the cantonment boards to collect professional tax from the areas falling in its ambit under section 60 of the Cantonments Act, 1924 (II of 1924).

The NWFP government has moved the Inter-Provincial Coordination Committee for resolving the dispute.

It has also raised the issue in its recommendations for a proposed bill on provincial autonomy.

The federal government has recently sought proposals from the provinces for the provincial autonomy bill which is expected to be tabled in the National Assembly soon.