Kazi Zahidul Hasan :
A former chief of National Board of Revenue (NBR) said on Saturday that the government must infuse dynamism and pursue a pro-people policy in the revenue administration for achieving the revenue collection target set for the upcoming fiscal year (FY) 2016-17.
He said that the government should also persue an investment and industry friendly policy to encourage investors and entrepreneurs in setting new ventures, which will have a major impact in boosting economic activities ultimately helping buoyancy in revenue collection.
“The revenue target fixed for the upcoming fiscal is though highly ambitious, it is achievable if the government can infuse the much needed dynamism in the National Board of Revenue along with keeping vibrancy in various economic sectors,” former NBR Chairman Dr. Muhammad Abdul Mazid told The New Nation yesterday.
He said, the target is ambitious considering the average revenue collection growth during the last few years.
“Growth of NBR’s revenue collection was 12.9 per cent on average over the last five years. But the proposed budget projects that the tax revenue collection by the NBR would grow by 35 per cent. As the given comparison shows a huge gap between the actual average revenue mobilasation and target, which I think is highly ambitious,” he said.
Referring to the average revenue growth, Abdul Mazid said, this is not their optimum level of performance and they can collect more revenues by expanding tax net, enhancing operational efficiency and reduce graft in the whole system to get a positive response from the taxpayers. The revenue receipt for the FY 17 has been estimated for Tk 2,42,752 crore. Of the total revenue target, NBR tax revenue is estimated for Tk 2,03,152 crore. “There is no denying there have been improvements in revenue collection by the officials in recent years with more people becoming tax-compliant. But a sizeable section of the population are still out of the tax net due to mainly absence of a friendly environment in the tax administration,” said Abdul Mazid.
The former NBR chairman further said, people remain tax-shy because of existing procedural complexity in the system. They are also reportedly facing harassment by taxmen to comply under the complicated system. So, a drastic change should be brought into the revenue administration applying a positive mindset of the taxmen so that people can eventually pay taxes without any hassle.
“Side by side, NBR should also enhance enforcement, monitoring and operational efficiency with technological and manpower up-gradation to increase tax collection and to combat evasion and fraud,” he added. He believed that once a friendly-environment is created in the revenue administration and the tax payments are made simple and hassle-free, people will pay income tax freely.
“Such reforms will not only have significant impact on the overall tax system, but will also increase the revenue collection significantly,” he noted. Abdul Mazid also said apart from these initiatives, the government’s political will is a must to widen the tax base.
When asked, the former NBR chairman said, it could have been better if the government could introduce new VAT law from the upcoming fiscal. He apprehends that failure to introduce new VAT law might hamper the expected revenue collection by the NBR in the next fiscal.
