KARACHI, July 8: Collection of revenue by Karachi Customs during last fiscal ending June 30, 2004, rose by 19.6 per cent to Rs61 billion as against Rs51 billion collected a year ago, official sources said on Thursday.
The revenue collection at import stage from all the customs posts of the country stood at Rs90 billion but Karachi Customs alone contributed or collected Rs61 billion or 68 per cent of the total collection.
During period under review the Collectorate of Appraisement collected Rs49 billion as against Rs40 billion of last year, thereby showing an increase of Rs9 billion in revenue collection.
Similarly, the Preventive Collectorate netted Rs12 billion up to June 30, 2004, compared to Rs11 billion collected last year giving a net rise of Rs1 billion in revenue collection.
Giving details of the revenue collection a spokesman of the collectorate said that Collectorate of Customs (Preventive) surpassed the target fixed at Rs12.9065 billion by the Central Board of Revenue by 0.17 per cent on collecting Rs12.086 billion in customs duty.
However, there was a fabulous increase in sales tax collection at import stage which stood at Rs28.369 billion or 11.6 per cent higher over the previous year collection of Rs25.389 billion.
Collector of Customs (Preventive) Mohammad Afzal Bhatti told Dawn that despite the fact that customs duty as well as imports remained the same as of the last year but better management enabled the authorities to improve upon their revenue collection.
He said that by plugging revenue leakages and doing proper assessment the revenue collection at import stage showed remarkable rise. Mr Bhatti further said that efforts made by the staff and officer in recovery of arears was another factor for higher collection.
Additional Collector Dr Zulfikar Malik said that taxpayers facilitation and cooperation extended by all stakeholders made it possible for the collectorate to improve upon its revenue collection.
He said lower duties leave little room for misdeclaration or leakages of revenue and in the new budget a further cut in duties would help the customs to stop such practices and in return more imports through official channels would increase revenue collection.