Amendments to Income Tax Ordinance 2001 to accommodate international regulatory requirements will help Pakistan control offshore tax avoidance and tax evasion. These views were expressed by Vishnu Raja Qavi, Senior Tax Consultant & Former Chief Tax Policy FBR at a seminar organized by Karachi Tax Bar Association (KTBA) at Auditorium Regional Tax Office, here Thursday. He said that section 116A was purposely added to maintain profiling of foreign assets of resident persons and cited that non residents were unlikely to get benefit of Non Recognition Rules (Sec.79 of ITO 2001).

Furthermore, he said Pakistan & India were the only two countries in Asia to achieve certification for AEOI under the multilateral convention and added that this was a huge responsibility on the countries that data-sharing was not compromised in any way. He also stressed upon the authorities that Avoidance of Double Treaty Agreements signed by Pakistan with different countries should be taken into account on case to case basis.

Qavi also suggested that multiple field formations inside FBR like BTB, I&I etc. should be abolished to single jurisdiction in order to ensure maximum facilitation to the taxpayers and added that the 25th Constitutional Amendment FATA & PATA would yield fruits by 2026. Chief Commissioners Badruddin Qureshi and Shafqat Kehar also attended the events.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2019