PkRevenue.com – Pakistan triumphed in the Sarsabz Volleyball Series 2024, securing the series against Australia with a decisive victory in the second match held at the Liaquat Gymnasium of Pakistan Sports Complex on Wednesday.
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Messi Delivers Record Five Assists in Inter Miami’s 6-1 Victory
Lionel Messi orchestrated a football masterclass, setting a new Major League Soccer (MLS) record by delivering five assists in a single match, propelling Inter Miami to a dominant 6-1 victory over New York Red Bulls at Chase Stadium on Saturday.
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Nadal Triumphs Over De Minaur in Madrid Open
Rafael Nadal, the Spanish tennis legend, marked a significant return to form at the Mutua Madrid Open by defeating Australian player Alex de Minaur with scores of 7-6 (6), 6-3 in a gripping second-round match.
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Pakistani Footballers Face Financial Struggles Ahead of FIFA World Cup 2026 Qualifier
As the pivotal FIFA Men’s World Cup 2026 Qualifier against Cambodia looms in October, Pakistani footballers find themselves grappling with significant financial challenges. These financial hurdles have become a growing cause for concern within the sports community.
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LTO Karachi hopes to achieve revenue collection target for 2022-2023
The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has recently appointed Sajidullah Siddiqui, a senior BS-21 officer, as the Chief Commissioner Inland Revenue of Large Taxpayers Office (LTO) Karachi.
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SBP imposes Rs1.45 billion penalty on 18 banks in 2021
KARACHI: The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has imposed Rs1.45 billion as monetary penalty on 18 financial institutions for violating regulatory provisions during the year ended December 31, 2021.
According to data compiled by PkRevenue.com related to significant action taken during the year 2021, the SBP imposed Rs1.45 billion as monetary penalty on 18 financial institutions.
The central bank issues data of significant actions against banks on quarterly basis. The detail of imposition of monetary penalty during each quarter of 2021 is as: January – March, Rs 97.6 million; April – June, Rs 525.25 million; July – June, Rs465.04 million; and October – December Rs58 million.
READ MORE: SBP imposes penalty of Rs58 million on five banks
The banks mostly violated regulatory provisions related to foreign exchange and general banking operations. Further, banks were also found violating instruction pertaining to anti-money laundering (AML) and counter financing of terrorism (CFT).
Besides, the banks had also violated instructions pertaining to customer due diligence (CDD) and know your customer (KYC).
READ MORE: SBP slaps Rs280 million penalty on National Bank
The details of penalty imposed on 18 banks is as follow:
01. Habib Bank Limited: Rs39.77 million
02. MCB Bank: Rs299.1 million
03. MCB Islamic Bank Limited: Rs 37.1 million
04. United Bank Limited: Rs49 million
05. Bank Alfalah Limited: Rs11.1 million
READ MORE: SBP imposes monetary penalty on eight banks
06. First Women Bank Limited: Rs31.57 million
07. Sindh Bank Limited: Rs62.18 million
08. Soneri Bank Limited: Rs12.6 million
09. Zarai Taraqiati Bank Limited: Rs75.76 million
10. The Punjab Provincial Cooperative Bank Limited: Rs32.5 million
11. Pak Brunai Investment Company Limited: Rs10.45 million
12. National Bank of Pakistan (NBP): Rs291 million
READ MORE: Habib Bank pays penalty of Rs42.2 million to SBP
13. Silk Bank Limited: Rs132.44 million
14. Industrial and Commercial Bank of China-Pakistan Branches: Rs13.54 million
15. Bank Alhabib Limited: Rs 13.68 million
16. The Bank of Punjab: Rs 12.54 million
17. Standard Chartered Bank (Pakistan) Limited: Rs11.04 million
18. Askari Bank Limited: Rs10.3 million
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Incentives approved for exchange companies on dollar surrender
ISLAMABAD: The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet on Friday approved incentive program for exchange companies on surrendering dollars in interbank.
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Sales tax collection from textile sector jumps six-fold
ISLAMABAD: The collection of sales tax from textile sector registered a six-fold increase in fiscal year 2019/2020 owing to elimination of zero-rated tax regime.
According to official statistics released by Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) the sales tax collection from textile sectors sharply increased to Rs61.2 billion during fiscal year 2019/2020 as compared with Rs8.7 billion in the preceding fiscal year, showing a growth of 602 percent.
The unprecedented growth in sales tax collection from this sector can be attributed to elimination of zero-rated scheme through Finance Act, 2019.
In the budget 2019/2020, the government decided to eliminate zero-rating scheme for textile sector and imposed normal 17 percent sales tax on all supply of textile products, except for those subject to exports.
The FBR issued Circular No. 01 of 2019 dated July 26, 2019 and explained that SRO 1125(I)/2011 dated December 12, 2011, relating to zero-rating of five export-oriented sectors, had been rescinded since July 01, 2019 through SRO 694(I)/2019 dated June 29, 2019.
From July 01, 2019, the items listed in the said SRO had been charged to sales tax at 17 percent at import and local supply. However, in case of integrated retail outlets, sales tax on finished textile and leather items were subject to 14 percent sales tax, according to the circular.
Further, all Sales Tax General Orders (STGOs) granting zero-rating on supply of electricity, gas, diesel, furnace oil and coal had been rescinded through STGO 100/2019 dated June 29, 2019.
The decision to eliminate the zero-rating was taken due to gross misuse of the scheme. The scheme also attracted issuance of bogus refunds on back of fake and flying invoices resulting huge monetary losses to the national exchequer.
However, in order to resolve the issue of exports in obtaining refunds under new schemes from July 01, 2019 the FBR introduced Fully Automated Sales Tax e-Refund (FASTER) system with a commitment that the refunds would be issued in 72 hours.
Sources in the FBR said that the collection of sales tax from textile sector would have been much higher but it was restricted due to economic slowdown after COVID-19.
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Pakistan Customs’ security, integrity at mercy of lappus
KARACHI: The sensitive data of Pakistan Customs and integrity of the department are totally at mercy of privately hired persons ‘lappus’ by Customs officers.
These lappus are not only accessing sensitive data of Pakistan Customs but also doing all illegal work for their bosses, which is commonly known as ‘settlement’.
The gravity of situation can be gauged with the recent example where a lappu auctioned of huge amount consignments where importer had paid duty and taxes.
The customs authorities apprehended one person in the case, who was identified as lappu and was working and representing customs officers for the last five to six years.
According to details a First Information Report (FIR) dated November 15, 2019 was lodged at Research and Development Department, Model Customs Collectorate of Appraisement (East) Customs House, Karachi.
The FIR was lodged by Shakeel John, Appraising Officer following a crime of removing goods from Shaheen Container Yard after an illegal auction of goods.
The FIR nominated persons included: Muhammad Zaki; Adeel Ahmed; Meer Rizwan Ali; and concerned staff and management of M/s Pak Shaheen Container Yard.
In the case three lots of consignments were auctioned valuing over Rs12 million on which importer had paid duty and taxes.
The importer namely Abid Japanwala made strong protest on illegal auction by customs authorities and demand recovery of his consignments.
The text of relevant paragraphs of reply submitted by Pak Shaheen to the FIR stated:
“… an LCL cargo bearing IGM No. 402/18 consisting of 10 pallets STC Copper Foil weighing 6053kgs was imported on 21.08.2018 by M/s. Paramount Radiators and forwarded to Pak Shaheen Container Terminal for clearance by the freight forwarders i.e. Facilities Shipping Agency.
“Since the cargo was not cleared within the prescribed time period as per Section 82 of the Customs Act, 1969, an auction lot number PS-216-10-18 was assigned to it and the customs was informed accordingly on October 15, 2018.
“On November 11, 2019, the importer namely Abid Japanwala approached the Terminal and informed that his cargo has been cleared by the customs and requested for rebate in storage charges as his cargo remained at the terminal for more than a year incurring heavy amount of storage charges.
“On receipt of such request from Japanwala the record of the terminal was checked and it was found that, as per record, the said cargo was auctioned by the Customs and on November 08, 2019 the delivery was made to the bidder Babar Saleem through his agent Mir Rizwan Ali.
“When Abid Japanwala was informed about the auction of his cargo, he showed his out of charge GD to the Head of Commercial Naveed Nabi Khan and appeared to be shocked and stated that how can his cargo be auctioned when he deposited the Customs duty.
“After seeing the out of Charge GD, Abid Japanwala was informed that as per customs rules no duty paid consignment can be auctioned and that he should take up his case with Collector (East) directly.
“He was also given a complete set of auction/delivery documents to take up his case with the Collector (East).
“We were later informed that the importer approached the Collector (East) along with the auction documents provided by the terminal as it was feared that some unscrupulous element managed to play fraud depriving the importer of his consignment and depriving the client of demurrage charges.”
The reply further pointed out:
“… On November 15, 2019, the Customs apprehended one Zaki who was working with the Customs staff at the terminal since last five to six years as customs assistant commonly known as ‘lappu’ and during all these years h ad attained the status of focal person of Customs and for all practical purposes he was representing the customs official.
“On November 16, 2019, Akmal Durrani, Assistant Collector posted at Pak Shaheen Terminal, called the concerned staff of Customer Services and interrogated them and also took the video recording of November 08, 2019 in which Zaki can been seen taking subject document from his car.”
The detailed reply by Pak Shaheen Terminal helped the terminal operator to clear its position in this fraud. This resulted that interim challan presented by the customs authorities at the Special Judge Customs and Taxation, Karachi dated December 02, 2019 the name of Pak Shaheen was excluded from the case.
The revelation of Pak Shaheen in its reply is eye opener for Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) and other relevant authorities that how privately hired persons or lappus were authorized access to customs records.
This is also surprising that how these unauthorized lappus getting entry to terminal yard.
The presence of lappus in Pakistan Customs is not new. The lappus are working for long time in the department and conducting official works on behalf of senior customs officials.
It is commonly known that the customs officers hire these people for their ‘speed money’.
The lappus as agent create win win situation for both customs officers and importers at the cost of national revenue. As facilitators lappus get huge commission beside their fixed income set by the customs officers.
These lappus have direct interaction with importers on those consignments where misdeclaration made. The customs officers are no where or have no direct links in such illegal activities.
The dangerous aspect of presence of lappus is access to sensitive data of Pakistan Customs, which has also strategic importance.
Recently, Prime Minister Imran Khan pointed out massive corruption in Pakistan Customs. Although the prime minister quoted exaggerated amount but the instant case may be an example that how much the customs collectors are earning through illegal means.
The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has issued many warnings to field formations to avoid the presence of unauthorized persons working within their jurisdictions. But all in vain as presence of lappus are still in the key places of Pakistan Customs.
FBR chairman Shabbar Zaidi, in May 2019 soon after becoming chairman, while taking notice of presence of large number of visitors for making the entire clearance system doubtful, had ordered Customs Wing to strictly restrict, entry into Customs Houses, only to the concerned traders, their authorized representatives and members and relevant trade bodies/ associations.
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FBR deploys IR officers at 20 sugar mills for monitoring of production, supplies
ISLAMABAD: Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has deployed officers of Inland Revenue at 20 sugar mills to monitor production and supply for checking tax evasion.
The IR officers have been deployed at the premises of sugar mills under Section 40B of Sales Tax Act, 1990 for the monitoring of stock, production and supply.
Sources told PkRevenue.com that Large Taxpayers Unit (LTU) Karachi had requested the FBR to allow monitoring of sugar mills as huge tax evasion was detected in the past.
Recently, the FBR conducted analysis of sugar production of the last year which revealed huge tax evasion by sugar mills.
The outcome of analysis showed that FBR and the Cane Commissioner of three provinces had a difference of 641,000 metric tons which showed that the sugar mills were under reporting their stock in order to evade tax payments.
It is also identified that the local supplies during the tax period of July 2019 fell by 255 percent due to enhancement in tax rate from eight percent in June 2019 to 17 percent in July 2019.
The analysis further revealed that the stock holding last year ending June 2018 was 3,147,000 metric tons where as closing stock of the year ending on June 2019 was only 2,230,778 metric tons, which showed 29 percent decline.
It is also pointed out that sugar manufacturers had declared high quantity of supplies during June 2019 to evade sales tax as the tax rate was to increase in July 2019.
The FBR analysis revealed that the sugarcane was the biggest raw material of sugar industry.
The undocumented/under-documented nature of this agriculture sector poses a great challenge to accurately gauge the quantity of sugarcane produced and supplied to a particular mill.
Considering the above facts the FBR allowed deployment of IR officers at the sugar mills.
It is worth mentioning that the FBR Chairman through an official memorandum barred the tax offices for invoking Section 40B of the Sales Tax Act, 1990 without prior permission of the board or Member IR Operations.
Following is the list of sugar mills where IR officers have been deployed:
01. M/s. Darya Khan Sugar Mills Limited.
02. M/s. Popular Sugar Mills Limited.
03. M/s. Deharki Sugar Mill Limited.
04. M/s. Adam Sugar Mill Limited.
05. M/s. Baba Farid Sugar Mill Limited.
06. M/s. Digri Sugar Mill Limited.
07. M/s. Mirpurkhas Sugar Mill Limited.
08. M/s. Faran Sugar Mills Limited.
09. M/s. Mehran Sugar Mills Limited.
10. M/s. Dewan Sugar Mills Limited.
11. M/s. Al-Abbas Sugar Mills Limited.
12. M/s. Ansari Sugar Mills Limited.
13. M/s. Bawany Sugar Mills Limited.
14. M/s. Larr Sugar Mills Limited.
15. M/s. New Dadu Sugar Mills Limited.
16. M/s. Rani Sugar Mills (Pvt) Limited
17. M/s. Al-Noor Sugar Mills Limited
18. M/s. Tando Allahyar Sugar Mills Limited
19. M/s. Habib Sugar Mills Limited
20. M/s. Sindabadgar Sugar Mills Limited