NEWS report in a national daily on Tuesday said four major gas distribution companies have dodged tax payment of Tk 13,277 crore to the national exchequer although they collected the money from clients as VAT and supplementary tax from 2009 to 2014. Quoting the officials of the National Board of Revenue (NBR) the report said the revenue officials in recent check ups detected the payment evasion and the companies are now trying to use different pretext to avoid the accountability. But the bigger question here is also that how such default could go undetected over a longer time. The other question is whether or not the money was misused and moved out from the government accounting system. We fear that not only the four company officials are responsible; the oversight agency officials should also be held equally accountable for it. The report said the total unpaid amount now stands at Tk 19,594 crore given the spill over of Tk 6318 crore as interest on the original amount. According to VAT Act, the non-payment of tax to the national exchequer is punishable crimes and we ask the government to initiate strict legal procedure to deal with the vested quarters engaged in breaking financial discipline and misusing government funds.Statistics said Titas Gas Transmission and Distribution Company, Karnaphuli Gas Transmission and Distribution Company, Bakhrabad Gas Transmission and Distribution Company and Jalalabad Gas Transmission and Distribution Company dodged the payment of taxes. The Large Taxpayer Unit of the NBR reportedly started legal procedures recently against the companies including filing cases to realize the dodged taxes. As per report Titas Gas withheld the highest amount of Tk 10,988 crore in VAT and supplementary tax followed by Karnaphuli Gas; which did not deposit Tk 1,268 crore. Bakhrabad Gas did not deposit Tk 672 crore and Jalalabad Gas refrained from depositing Tk 348 crore. The companies are now declining to deposit the money citing the international oil companies’ (IOCs) exemptions from paying such taxes, which are paid by Petrobangla as per agreement. A senior official of the NBR said such comparison is simply unacceptable because they are not IOCs and they can’t claim such benefits. As the news report said the four companies deposited taxes money to the national exchequer only collected from the industrial subscribers. But they did not deposit the taxes collected from the subscribers of the electricity, fertilizer, CNG, captive power plants, tea garden, commercial and household sectors. It looks like a total anarchy and may have occurred under highly influential persons in political establishments. We ask the NBR authorities to totally scrutinize the tax evasion incidents by the four gas companies and bring the violators of the standard accounting system to book. In our view it may be part of a big loopholes in other utility services and the government should strengthen the monitoring and other oversight capacity to deal with the officials breaking financial discipline.
