UNB, Dhaka :
The National Board of Revenue (NBR) has failed to achieve its revised revenue collection target for fiscal 2013-14 although its chairman had expressed his high hopes several times that the tax regulatory body will be able to achieve it.
The NBR fell short of its revenue collection target by Tk 4,487 crore though the revenue collection growth posted a 10.41 percent growth, according to NBR data.
The revenue collection target for the NBR in 2013-14 fiscal was Tk 136,000 crore. In February, the NBR requested the Finance Minister to revise the target showing its own grounds. Later, the Finance Minister reduced the target to Tk 125,000 crore.
Sources at the NBR blamed the unprecedented political violence during the October-January period of the last fiscal for the failure as it affected the incomes of people, especially that of businessmen.
While revising the target, the Finance Minister too cited political turmoil for lowering the target saying that the political disturbance hit the revenue collection hard like other sectors of the country.
As per the NBR final report, it has been able to collect Tk 120,512.83 crore against the
revised target of Tk 125,000 crore. NBR Chairman Ghulam Hossain had repeatedly said his organisation had taken some effective measures in May-June and there will be no deficit this time. In 2012-13 fiscal, the NBR had collected Tk 109,051 crore against the target of Tk 112,259 crore, showing a deficit Tk 3,208 crore.
In 2011-12 fiscal, the NBR surpassed the target by collecting Tk 93,700 crore against the target of Tk 92,370 crore.
Among NBR’s three wings, Customs, Income Tax and VAT, only Customs was successful to achieve the target in the last fiscal (2013-14). The target for Customs was Tk 32,870 crore and it collected Tk 33,231 crore at the end of the year.
This figure is interesting as the import in the country was a little bit higher although the country had passed a vigorous political turmoil. The collection of VAT was Tk 43,726 crore against the target of Tk 46,850 crore.
The collection deficit of income tax stood at Tk 1444.50 crore in the last fiscal. The target for this wing was Tk 44,360 crore, but it collected Tk 42,915.50 crore.
The NBR has collected Tk 640.31 crore from the travel tax and various other taxes against the target of Tk 920 crore.
A senior NBR official attributed the shortfall to the declining collection from the large taxpayers’ unit (LTU), where all banks, corporate entities and big business houses are included and the decline in earning profit by private commercial banks, especially in the first half of the fiscal.
