A spokesman of IROs Farhan Sartaj told Business Recorder that all the officers of the Inland Revenue Service posted at Lahore held a meeting in the conference hall of the Tax House on Wednesday. They strongly condemned what they called the "unjustified, illegal, arbitrary and subjective conviction of Muhammad Saleem, Additional Commissioner Inland Revenue, RTO Faisalabad through an unjustified and biased order of the Federal Tax Ombudsman.
The meeting decided through a unanimously adopted resolution that:
(a) No officer of Inland Revenue shall appear and attend any proceedings before the FTO or its regional offices across Pakistan and;
(b) All the officers shall observe a pen down strike forthwith to be followed by an indefinite strike if the order of conviction of the officer is not stayed / struck down and imprisonment award is not vacated.
The officers and staff members of the FBR Gujranwala region also took out a procession against Saleem's conviction and demanded his immediate release and withdrawal of contempt notice against him. It may be added that Federal Tax Ombudsman (FTO) Dr Muhammad Shoaib Suddle had sentenced Muhammad Saleem, Additional Commissioner Inland Revenue Faisalabad for three months with a fine of Rs 50,000 for contempt of court and directly sent him to Adiala Jail, Rawalpindi from the court's premises earlier this week.