August 04, 2008	Monday	Sha'aban 1 429

HYDERABAD, Aug 3: Office-bearers of Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association have called upon the government to remove all hurdles in the way of issuance of working licence by provincial agriculture departments of Sindh and Punjab and abolish the refundable taxes on cotton ginning.

They said that non-renewal of working licences by the agriculture department and non-issuance of clearance certificates by the excise department had forced them to shut around 1200 factories from August 1 in the country.

They expressed their resolve that they would not reopen their factories unless their demands regarding the withdrawal of all other taxes and renewal of working licence are met.

Addressing a news conference at the press club here on Sunday, chairman of the associationa and office-bearers said that working licence was renewed after every June 30 by the provincial agriculture department but since the government had imposed a fee of Rs5 on each cotton bale this year which ginners considered highly controversial and thus refused to pay it.

They said that before the renewal of the working licence by the agriculture department the excise department issues a clearance certificate which is to be submitted to former.

The excise department was authorised to recovery the said Rs5 fee and had linked issuance of clearance certificate with payment of the fee, they said.

They said since clearance certificate was withheld by excise department the agriculture department didn’t renew the working licence.

They said in a general body meeting of the association on July 28 it was decided to observe a strike from August 1, because if they run the factories it would be considered illegal in absence of working licence.

They said it was decided in 1991-92 between the Federal Board of Revenue and the association that they would pay one per cent fixed tax regardless of the fact they suffer losses.

They said they were paying this tax regularly and around Rs200 million were paid in last fiscal year in terms of fixed tax and this year they would pay Rs300 million in taxes.

They said in breach of agreement that no new tax would be imposed government slapped some taxes under Workers Welfare Fund two years ago.

They said that refundable taxes should also be withdrawn because when they seek refund of taxes around 30 to 40 per cent of it was always pocketed by corrupt officials.

They held bureaucrats responsible for that and said that they had no complaint against the PPP government because the bureaucracy was the same.

They demanded of government to remove all hurdles in the way of renewal of working licence and do away with Rs5 fee on each cotton bale.

They called for scrapping clean cotton project and urged the government to declare the cotton ginning industry as fully zero rated as had been done in case of textile industry. They said regular electricity supply should be maintained to ginning factories.