ISLAMABAD: In response of audit notices issued to over a million taxpayers across the country, only 2,013 taxpayers have so far opted for revising their tax returns by paying Rs43.36 million additionally, a top tax official said on Wednesday.

The details came from the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) a day after the decision of the board to waive the penalty along with exclusion of salaried class from the audit, while 693,561 audit cases of non-salaried persons and entities will remain intact.

Three top members of the board — Member Taxpayers’ Audit, Nausheen Javaid Amjad, Member FATE, Dr Hamid Ateeq Sarwar and Member Policy and Spokesperson FBR Dr Muhammad Iqbal were tasked to brief media over the issue of automatic selection of over 1m taxpayers for audit due to late filing of tax returns between 2015-17.

Nausheen told the journalists that the FBR has offered non-salaried persons and entities to avail the automatic scheme of closure of audit by paying additional tax. She said this scheme is only available until Dec 31.

Regarding the status of those salaried taxpayers who had paid the penalty amount, she said it will be refunded.

However, the member did not provide details of year-wise late filers of tax returns data. She said that maximum audit notices were issued in the jurisdiction of regional tax officer Lahore, followed by RTO-III in Karachi.

Answering another question about delay in the audit policy, she said it is a routine issue and will be announced when it has been finalised.

Dr Muhammad Iqbal said the decision of waiving penalty was taken to facilitate the salaried taxpayers. He said it was noticed that some of the taxpayers filed their returns with a gap of two or three years.

He defended the amendment made in the income tax law, allowing automatic selection of late return filers for audit.

He said it was meant for documentation of the economy and as a lever for deterrence for non-filers.

He avoided answering questions regarding the status of notices issued to politicians and other high net worth individuals. “The law prohibits me to disclose the tax details of any individual”, the spokesperson said.

Responding to a question, Dr Iqbal said the FBR has fully implemented the 100-day agenda of the present government by introducing a number of reforms in the board’s operations.

He said the details of reforms will be announced in the press conference by Prime Minister Imran Khan.

Dr Hamid Ateeq Sarwar said that notices were issued automatically without any distinction. He said more than 50,000 notices were alone issued in the jurisdiction of RTO Rawalpindi.

Answering questions, Dr Sarwar said that COAS Qamar Javed Bajwa had filed his income tax returns a month before the deadline. He said that Pakistan was depositing an amount of Rs400m under the head of salary per month with the RTO Rawalpindi.

Answering another question, he said that the army’s marriage banquet, Topi Rakh, was paying maximum taxes among all other such banquet halls in Rawalpindi.

He said the trend of tax return filing is high among armed personnel and is also a criteria of consideration for promotion of army officials.

Published in Dawn, November 29th, 2018