Author: Mrs. Anjum Shahnawaz

FBR issues guidelines for recruitment in BS-01 to BS-05

ISLAMABAD: Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) on Wednesday issued guidelines for recruitment against vacant posts (BS-1 to BS-5) in the Inland Revenue Department.

The FBR advertised the vacant posts in BS-01 to BS-05 on May 09, 2021.

The authorities had advised the candidates to submit their applications directly to the concerned IR field offices by May 25, 2021.

The recruitment process has to be finalized by the field formations by July 28, 2021, as per instructions of the Establishment Division.

In order to ensure transparency and merit based selection/recruitment, following guidelines have been prepared in the light of relevant rules and latest instructions of the government, to have uniformity in the recruitment process, which are for guidance and compliance of field formations.

These guidelines are of supplemental nature, do not over-ride the relevant rules/regulations and instructions of the Government on the subject:

The advertisement for recruitment shall be affixed on the Notice Board of each field office.

The recruitment process must be transparent, merit based and must be strictly completed

in accordance with the relevant rules/procedures/instructions issued from time to time.

The concerned field formations will conduct requisite test for the posts where warranted under the service rules. No testing agency can be engaged for the recruitment process in the light of latest instruction of the Federal Government conveyed vide Establishment Division 0.M No. 53/1/2008-SP dated 06.05.2020. It may be noted that the Federal Government has withdrawn its O.M. dated 29.07.2019 (Annex-II) regarding conducting balloting for the post in BPS 1-5 vide SRO 198(0/2020 dated 11.03.2020 (Annex-Ill), so there will be no balloting for recruitment against any posts in any grade.

The heads of field formation shall designate an officer of their formation to act as focal person to assist the relevant Departmental Selection Committees (DSCs) in the selection/recruitment process against posts falling under their jurisdiction.

The concerned field formation will prepare the lists/particulars of the qualified candidates with score awarded for the skill test and submit the lists to the concerned departmental Selection Committees (DSCs) specifically constituted in each field formation for the purpose of recruitment.

After compilation of recommendations for selection and signing of minutes of the meetings, the Chairman of the DSCs shall forward the signed minutes to the respective Appointing Authority for approval. The selected candidates shall be issued offer of appointment by the concerned office on prescribed format.

The appointment letters must be issued through Registered post to ensure timely delivery. Result shall be displayed on Notice Board of the respective office.

The number of existing vacant posts in the respective field formation must be re-confirmed from Budget Book prior to issuance of offer of appointment.

The respective Appointing authorities through their designated focal persons will be personally responsible for any lapse i.e recruitment made in excess of the actual number of vacant posts in the respective formation or any procedural lapse / irregularity and record will be saved / preserved for Audit and Accountability by the Focal Person.

Domiciles of candidates shall be verified in the light of Establishment Division’s letter No. 5/7/2009/PPRAC-Vol.X11 dated 31.03.2021 and No. 5/1/2021-(R) dated 06.04.2021 (Annex-VII), (Annex-VIII)

A list of finally selected candidates against the vacant posts may invariably be forwarded to the Board for information and record by each office upon completion of recruitment process.

No candidate shall be appointed without verification of character / antecedent and Medical Fitness Certificate by Authorized Medical Board.

These guidelines are being issued in supersession of earlier one issued on the subject on May, 2021

May 19, 2021
Engro selects technology partners for polypropylene production facility

KARACHI: Engro Corporation, Pakistan’s premier conglomerate, has selected Honeywell UOP and W. R. Grace & Co. as technology partners to use their licensed process technology for the $1.5 billion, 750,000 Propane Dehydrogenation (“PDH”) and Polypropylene (“PP”) production facility, that would make Pakistan a self-sufficient producer of Polypropylene, a statement said on Tuesday.

Polypropylene resin is used in the manufacturing of a variety of daily use consumer products including woven bags, food and non-food packaging, films, sheets, household containers, battery casings, kitchenware, electrical appliances, bottles, caps, pipes & fittings, medical equipment, and a wide range of other products. To meet these needs, polypropylene has a local annual demand of 500,000 with an expected grow rate of 7 percent annually.

Honeywell will provide its C3 Oleflex™ technology and basic engineering design services, in addition to equipment, catalysts and adsorbents for the plant. Since 2011, most of the new dehydrogenation projects globally have been based on UOP C3 Oleflex technology.

However, this will mark the first use of C3 Oleflex in Pakistan. The technology is designed to have a lower cash cost of production and higher return on investment when compared to competing dehydrogenation technologies.

Its low energy consumption, low emissions and fully recyclable, platinum-alumina-based catalyst system, helps minimize its impact on the environment. The independent reactor and regeneration design of the Oleflex technology helps maximize operating flexibility and onstream reliability.

W. R. Grace & Co., the leading independent supplier of polyolefin catalyst technology and polypropylene (PP) process technology, will provide its state-of-the-art UNIPOL® PP Process Technology to help achieve mechanical and operational simplicity. The process technology, coupled with Grace’s proprietary catalyst and donor systems and the UNIPOL UNIPPAC® Process Control System, allows for maximum performance.

While announcing the new partnerships, Ghias Khan, President & CEO of Engro Corporation said that, “Engro continues on its journey towards solving the most pressing issues of our time by investing in projects which will serve to be catalysts of growth for Pakistan.

“For the Project, we have selected Honeywell and Grace as our technology partners based on their extensive experience and cutting-edge solutions that have helped to set up such projects globally. This collaboration will support the advanced studies for the Project, which can be a significant milestone for Engro and Pakistan towards import substitution that will help build foreign exchange reserves, while also enhancing the petrochemicals landscape of the country.”

Pakistan faces a critically adverse balance of payments situation due to the country’s continued reliance on imports, and petrochemicals are one of the largest imports of the country, contributing around $2 billion to the import bill. Currently, Pakistan spends about $600 million on annual import of polypropylene.

With decades of experience in petrochemicals and a commitment to further develop its footprint in the petrochemicals vertical, Engro started conducting the commercial feasibility of the PDH complex in April 2019.

Recently, Engro announced an investment of over $30 million to conduct engineering, design and technical studies including a Front End Engineering Design (FEED) study in relation to the Project.

The studies will help Engro delineate the technical complexities, refine the investment cost estimates, enhance its commercial understanding and devise mitigation strategies for potential risks of the project.

May 19, 2021
KTBA seeks further date extension for sales tax payment, return filing

KARACHI: Karachi Tax Bar Association (KTBA) on Tuesday urged the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) to further extend the last date for sales tax payment and filing monthly return as taxpayers are unable to comply with statutory requirement due to extended Eid holidays.

The tax bar asked the tax authorities to extend the date of payment of sales tax and date of e-filing of the monthly sales tax return for the period April 2021 till May 24, 2021 and May 27, 2021, respectively to facilitate members of the bar and the compliant taxpayers to fulfill their legal obligation.

While referring to a notification previously issued by the FBR to extend the date for payment of sales tax and filing monthly return for the period April 2021 issued on May 06, 2021, the date of payment was extended up to May 18, 2021 followed by filing of sales tax return till May 21, 2021.

The KTBA said that may taxpayers and bar members had approached the association informing that the extended date (two days) for payment of sales tax for the tax period April 2021 was insufficient as businesses were not functional properly after Eid Holidays that were during May 10 to May 15, 2021 followed by Sunday on May 16, 2021.

The KTBA also highlighted that in many cases taxpayers were unable to submit Annexure C as the last date of furnishing of Annexure C was May 10, 2021 which was also a holiday on account of Eid. It is important to note that unless Annexure C is submitted, sales tax payment amount cannot be calculated as payment of sales tax is dependent upon submission of Annexure C.

The tax bar further informed that provincial revenue authorities had extended deadline for payments and filing of their respective sales tax returns between May 21 and May 27.

“It is important to highlight that federal sales tax return cannot be furnished before the dates as extended by the provincial revenue authorities owing to the fact that input tax relating to services falling under the provincial domain can only be claimed in federal sales tax return once corresponding provincial sales tax return has been submitted by respective service provider,” the KTBA said.

May 19, 2021
ABAD demands abolishing regulatory duty on steel bars

KARACHI: The Association of Builders and Developers (ABAD) on Tuesday called on the government to abolish the Regulatory Duty (RD) and Additional Regulatory Duty (ARD) on the import of steel bars, emphasizing the need to stabilize their soaring prices in the domestic market.
(more…)

May 18, 2021
FBR launches module for online hearing in audit, assessment cases

The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has taken a significant leap into the digital era with the launch of a software platform for conducting online hearings in audit and assessment cases, as announced by an FBR spokesperson on Tuesday.
(more…)

May 18, 2021
Stock market gains 186 points in range bound trading

KARACHI: The stock market gained 186 points on Tuesday in a range bound trading activity during the day. The benchmark KSE-100 index of Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) closed at 45,982 points as against previous day’s closing of 45,796 points, showing an increase of 186 points.

Analysts at Arif Habib Limited said that the market traded in a range during the session that saw an oscillation of -178 points and +238 points.

The decline observed earlier, on the back of profit booking in Technology stocks which triggered selling pressure in Banks, E&P and O&GMCs.

A rebound in buying activity brought back interest in PSO which helped pull stock price up by a good margin from LDCP.

Activity remained skewed towards GGL, UNITY, TRG and TELE which have made a robust rally in the past couple of months. Among scrips, WTL topped the volumes with 49.5 million shares, followed by TELE (49.1 million) and GGL (47.2 million).

Sectors contributing to the performance include E&P (+80 points), O&GMCs (+74 points), Vanaspati (+37 points), Technology (+30 points) and Fertilizer (+18 points).

Volumes increased from 437.4 million shares to 536.5 million shares (+23 percent DoD). Average traded value also increased by 14 percent to reach US$ 151 million as against US$ 151 million.

Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes include WTL, TELE, GGL, UNITY and TRG, which formed 38 percent of total volumes.

Stocks that contributed positively to the index include PSO (+50 points), TRG (+43 points), UNITY (+37 points), MARI (+31 points) and PPL (+21 points). Stocks that contributed negatively include BAHL (-26 points), LUCK (-15 points), MCB (-14 points), SYS (-13 points) and ANL (-12 points).

May 18, 2021
Remittances hit all-time monthly high of $2.8bn in April

KARACHI: State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Tuesday said that the inflow of workers’ remittances rose to an all-time monthly high of $2.8 billion in April 2021, which is 56 percent higher than during the same month last year.

On a cumulative basis, remittances have also surpassed previous records. At $ 24.2 billion in July-April FY21, remittances grew by 29 percent over the same period last year and have already crossed the full FY20 level by more than $1 billion.

Remittance inflows during July-April FY21 were mainly sourced from Saudi Arabia ($6.4 billion), United Arab Emirates ($5.1 billion), United Kingdom ($3.3 billion) and the United States ($2.2 billion).

Proactive policy measures by the Government and SBP to encourage more inflows through formal channels, curtailed cross border travel in the face of COVID-19, altruistic transfers to Pakistan amid the pandemic, orderly foreign exchange market conditions and, more recently, Eid-related inflows have contributed to record levels of remittances this year.

May 18, 2021
Foreign exchange reserves increase to $22.91 billion

KARACHI: The foreign exchange reserves of the country increased by $167 million to $22.91 billion by week ended May 07, 2021, State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) said on Monday.

The foreign exchange reserves of the country were at $22.743 billion by week ended April 30, 2021.

The foreign exchange reserves held by the SBP increased by $176 million to $15.774 billion by week ended May 07, 2021 as compared with $15.598 billion by week ended April 30, 2021. The SBP attributed the weekly increase in the foreign exchange reserves to the government’s official inflows.

The foreign exchange reserves held by commercial banks eased by $9 million to $7.136 billion by week ended May 07, 2021 as compared with $7.145 million on the week ended by April 30, 2021.

May 17, 2021
Petroleum prices kept unchanged for next fortnight

The government of Pakistan has decided to keep the prices of petroleum products unchanged during the next fortnight. The decision, made on Monday, entails absorbing a tax loss of approximately Rs2.77 billion.
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May 17, 2021
OGDCL discovers gas reserves in Balochistan

KARACHI: Oil and Gas Development Authority (OGDCL) on Monday announced gas discovery at Jandran X-04 located in District Barkhan, Balochistan Province.

The company said that the structure of Jandran X-04 was delineated, drilled and tested using OGDCL’s in house expertise.

“The well was drilled down to the depth of 1200m into Parh Limestone. Based on Wireline logs data, successfully DST was carried out in Mughal Kot Formation wherein the Well tested 7.08 Million Standard Cubic Feet Per Day (MMSCFD) gas and 0.55 Barrels Per Day (BPD) condensate with Well Head Flowing Pressure (WHFP) of 1300 Pounds Per Square Inch (Psi) at 32/64” Choke size.”

The OGDCL said that the discovery of Jandran X-04 is the result of aggressive exploration strategy adopted by the company. “It has opened a new avenue and would add to the hydrocarbon reserves of OGDCL and the country.”

May 17, 2021