Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The legislative body of the Upper House of Parliament on Thursday was informed that the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has established a new Intelligent Tax System, which will help analyze the exact data of taxes collected by mobile phone operators.

Through this system, the exact usage and tax collection process would be properly monitored by the FBR. For this purpose, a pilot project for real-time connectivity was being launched, which might start working by the end of January 2017. The FBR representative expressed these views while briefing the Senate Standing Committee on Information Technology and Telecommunication, which met today at Parliament House, under the chairmanship of Senator Shahi Syed.

Senator Rehman Malik asked about the details and figures collected on account of withholding tax from cellular phone subscribers and the mechanism adopted for returning the same to them. FBR replied that a mechanism was being worked out and in 3-4 months they would submit a detailed report to the committee in this regard.

Chairman of the calso observed that it was a serious issue where billions of rupees were being collected on account of GST, WHT and Service Charges from cellular subscribers, even those poor people of Pakistan who do not fall under the tax network and unfortunately the FBR still had no mechanism to analyze the taxes collected by telecom companies. Resultantly, the FBR had failed to provide relief to the common man. Members of the committee suggested that legislation might be brought in through the parliament in this regard.

The Chairman committee also directed to provide comprehensive details of Sales Tax / FED deposited by the telecom companies into the Government Treasury of Federation as well as all provinces during the last three years. While inquiring about the actions taken by the Ministry on the recommendations of the committee issued in its last meeting regarding payment of pension to the pensioners of PTCL at the rate announced by the government, the committee was briefed by the Ministry that the matter was still subjudice in the apex court.

On a query raised by the Chairman Committee regarding the next date for the hearing of the case, it was apprised that the same had not been fixed as yet. The Chairman Committee further inquired about the efforts of the ministry made by them so far in that regard.

Responding to another query raised by the Chairman Committee regarding release of outstanding salaries to the teaching staff of the TIP School and College as recommended by the Committee earlier, it was apprised that all the payments have been made to ten employees who have been released by the PTCL and the rest of them were in litigation. This agenda was deferred for the next meeting and the Chairman directed the Ministry to give a briefing about their efforts in that regard as well as other committee recommendations given by the committee earlier.

Senator Taj Muhammad Afridi, convener of the sub-committee, also presented a report which was constituted to redress the grievances / problems being faced by the USF to launch its projects in the Provinces of Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and FATA. While highlighting the salient features of the report, he appreciated the cooperation extended by the ministry of IT and USF and also felicitated the members of the subcommittee for their efforts and the role played by them during the proceedings of the sub-committee.