FBR not to share data of third-party information with Nadra

ISLAMABAD: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) will not share data of third-party information with National Database Registration Authority (Nadra) as sharing of the data is barred under Income Tax Law.

“The FBR cannot share third party information with Nadra for analytical or any other purposes as the income tax law does not permit for sharing of taxpayers’ information with anyone,” FBR’s Member Information Technology (IT) Asim Ahmed told journalists in a press briefing here on Wednesday.

He said that the Nadra could charge minimal fee amount as service provider after integration of its data with the FBR but exact fee would only be determined after signing of MoU. The FBR has been developing its database with help of other stakeholders and enabling clause to this effect was made part of the Finance Act 2020 with the approval of Parliament. Now the FBR has made crystal clear that its third party data will not be shared with anyone including Nadra for any purpose arguing that the income tax law does not allow sharing of any such information.

The FBR’s Member Taxpayer Audit Syed Nadeem Rizvi and Member Inland Revenue (Policy) Mohammad Tariq and Member IT Asim Ahmed briefed journalists on Wednesday stated that the FBR introduced simplified tax return forms for salaried individuals and small retailers having annual turnover up to Rs10 million could avail this facility.

The FBR’s Member IR (Policy) Mohammad Tariq said that the agreement signed with small traders did not bar the tax machinery for not getting wealth statement through income tax returns. “With retailers’ turnover up to Rs10 million, around 0.2 million retailers will get benefits from this introduced simplified tax returns form,” he added.

The FBR has targeted to facilitate small traders having monthly turnover of around Rs8,33,000. “We have introduced one-page return form for salaried individuals,” said Nadeem Rizvi and added that it was the maximum efforts for achieving simplification that should be appreciated by everyone.

They also said that the FBR would launch awareness campaign through media and chief commissioners would be directed to educate and facilitate taxpayers in their respective jurisdictions.

They said that only 3 percent return filers out of around 2.7 million had filed returns through manual forms while all remaining filers availed online filing facility. The FBR’s Member IR Policy said that they had run different benchmark to ascertain exact number of beneficiaries for availing simplified tax forms as first they envisaged benchmark of annual turnover of 100 million and found that it would benefit only 17,000 retailers. So the FBR finally decided to provide maximum incentives to small traders so the turnover limit was slashed down to just Rs10 million that would now benefit around 175,000 to 200,000 retailers all over the country.

The FBR’s Member IT said that efforts were made to upgrade PRAL system so it was hoped that online filing of tax returns would not be choked this year. “The FBR envisages 20 to 25 percent growth for receiving income tax returns this year against over 2.6 million last year,” the FBR’s Spokesman Nadeem Rizvi said but added in the same breath that there was no target but efforts would be made to maximise number of return filers.

The FBR also developed Asaan TaxAap and this could be downloaded on phone within next few days. He said that the FBR was also considering to allow other private companies for placing online facilities for filing of income tax returns but they were analyzing all security checks to ensure security of data. The FBR will issue pre-filled income tax returns for the salaried class in coming days.