KARACHI: The Federal Board of Revenue has suspended notices issued to builders and developers for providing details of allottees up to June 38, 2018. The decision was taken by FBR’s Broadening of Tax Base (BTB) programme director general Tanveer Malik on the request of the Association for Builders and Developers (ABAD). The board has also urged the association to pursue investors for availing the tax amnesty scheme recently announced by Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi. The decisions were announced by Malik at a meeting at ABAD House here on Thursday. ABAD Chairman Arif Yousuf Jeewa, Senior Vice Chairman Fayyaz Ilyas, Vice Chairman Sohail Warind, Chairman Southern Region Altaf Tai, Commissioner Tax MS Shazia, Additional Commissioner Mumtaz Ahmed and a large number of ABAD members were present on the occasion. Tanveer Malik said, “it is a fact that most of the black money is used in sale and purchase of land and that the government will adopt stringent measures to widen the tax net from July 1, 2018, and strict action will be taken against people who will not announce source of their money”. He added that there were only four hundred thousand tax-payers in Pakistan which was a very low number in comparison to the country’s population. He clarified that the purpose behind asking for information of the allottees from builders and developers was just to help with the widening of tax net and assured them the information would never be used to harass builders and developers. While announcing suspension of notices issued to builders and developers for providing information of their allottees, he said that this issue will be solved in consultation with ABAD. He said that tax-payers were the saviors of the country. Terming the tax amnesty as a loot sale, he invited people with unaccounted for funds to avail the opportunity. He said that those who would not be able to justify their assets after July 1 would face strict action. He said that the target of the FBR was not people from the middle class or lower middle class but ‘the big fish’. Published in Daily Times, April 20th 2018.