ISLAMABAD, Feb 17: The chairman, Central Board of Revenue (CBR), M Abdullah Yousuf said on Thursday that 12 regional tax offices (RTOs) will be put in place by end of the year as part of re-vamping of the tax administration.

Speaking at the quarterly conference of the income tax commissioners here, the chairman said the RTOs would be operational by December 2005 in 12 major cities of the country, which would also include at least one appellate authority, which could be increased if required.

It was for the first time in the history of Pakistan, the chairman said, that $150 million were being invested in reforming and automating the tax machinery that would help in reducing the cost of doing business.

After the entire transformation in this sector, the chairman said, "Our focus should be on expansion of tax base." He asked the commissioners to come up with ideas to expand the tax base.

About taxpayer-tax collector relations, Mr Yusuf emphasized that element of mistrust between the two must be removed. "Unpleasant relationship between taxpayers and tax officials must end," he said.

"We must trust and give confidence to taxpayers," the chairman said and added, the taxpayers must be educated and facilitated through the use of media and technology.

The Chairman said: "we have the ability to reach to the actual earnings of the taxpayers. The extensive data available with the departments like Wapda, mobile phone companies, data bank of NADRA and immigration, etc., could help in assessing the true income and earnings of the taxpayers.

"There is a need that the system must automatically bring out definite information about any taxpayer to enable the department to confront him convincingly," he added.