Staff Reporter :
The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court (SC) on Wednesday has ordered the BRAC (Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee) to pay Tk 404.20 crore unpaid tax because it does not enjoy tax relief facility.
A five-member bench headed by Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha passed the order upon a petition filed by the government.
Earlier on December 14, 2014 the HC exempted the BRAC from paying tax considering it as a charitable organization. The Commissioner of Taxes then filed appeal against the verdict. The HC delivered the verdict following separate income tax reference applications filed by the BRAC challenging the notices issued by the Tax Commissioner seeking Tk 404.20 crore as income tax between 1993-`94 and 2011-`12.
BRAC was not paying the taxes saying that it was a charitable organization and thus it should not pay tax. But the Commissioner of Taxes argued that the organization was making profit from many projects of its own.
Now the leading non-government organization would have to pay Tk 404,20,58,892 as income taxes for 11 tax-years.
BRAC, an international development organization based in Bangladesh, is the largest non-governmental developmental organization in the world in terms of number of employees established by Sir Fazle Hasan Abed.
BRAC is present in all 64 districts of Bangladesh as well as other countries in Asia, Africa and the United States.
The organization is 70 to 80 percent self-funded through a number of commercial enterprises that include a dairy and food project and a chain of retail handicraft stores branded as Aarong.
