Business-friendly budget demanded

Islamabad : The traders’ community of the country has demanded of the federal government to make the budget as traders friendly and simplify the tax collection system if it wanted to achieve revenue generation targets for the next fiscal year.

Addressing a presser here, President of Markazi Tanzeem-e-Tajran, Muhammad Kashif Chaudhry called upon the government to announce a relief package for traders who were affected by COVID-19 in the last over one year.

Kashif Chaudhry also asked the government to introduce a fixed tax system to bring the turnover tax to 0.25 percent. He also suggested double or triple documentation and registration with sales tax on the volume of business instead of the size of the shop. He also proposed that tax exemption should be given up to the annual and income of Rs1.2 million. Other leaders of the traders’ community including Suleiman Siddiqui, Sharafat Ali Mubarak, Sharjeel Mir, Tahir Taj Bhatti, and others were also present on the occasion.

Kashif Chaudhry pointed that the government could generate over Rs800 billion annual revenue if it takes traders' community info confidence and fulfil promises made to them. He complained that traders always cooperated with the Government for meeting revenue collection targets but it was FBR that created complications in already settled issues He also asked the FBR to introduce an income tax return form as agreed with the traders to close doors to corruption, blackmailing, and bribery. "In presence of the existing structure of FBR, neither the revenue generation targets will be met nor the country will make progress,” he said.