Photo : Messenger
The National Board of Revenue (NBR) lagged behind its collection target in the first eight months of the current financial year, with the deficit standing at Tk 18,221 crore.
This happened despite a 16 per cent growth in revenue collection in this period.
According to NBR sources, revenue collected between July 2023 and February 2024 was Tk 2,26,586 crore. As a result, another Tk 1,83,414 crore needs to be collected in the remaining four months of the current fiscal year.
The NBR’s revenue collection target for the current financial year was initially set at Tk 4,30,000 crore. To achieve the target, growth should be about 30 per cent compared to last year’s collection.
In such a situation, the target has been reduced by Tk 20,000 crore to Tk 4,10,000 crore.
The single largest increase in revenue collection in the first eight months of FY24 came from income tax, which was nearly 20 per cent. Besides, income tax collection rose by 29 per cent in February.
On the other hand, there has been an increase of about 11 per cent in import tax collection and more than 16 per cent in VAT collection from July 2023 to February 2024.
A senior NBR official, who did not wish to be named, told The Daily Messenger field-level monitoring had been increased while Tax Deduction at Source (TDS), which was not applicable in the past, was now being made mandatory.
“The implementation of the Proof of Submission of Return (PSR) has also been made mandatory. Due to these reasons, there has been good growth in income tax collection,” he said.
He further said revenue collection had also increased because of the rise in imports during the holy month of Ramadan.
Meanwhile, NBR Chairman Abu Hena Md Rahmatul Muneem on March 24 held a meeting with field-level officials at the NBR building in Agargaon of the capital to review the revenue collection situation.
At the meeting, officials were instructed to increase monitoring in order to stop tax evasion and work more intensively to collect the revenue stuck in lawsuits.
A major part of the revenue comes from the implementation of the Annual Development Programme (ADP). Usually, revenue collection is higher towards the end of the year. But this time, the rate of ADP implementation is very low. As a result, it is expected that revenue collection will be less at the end of the year.
Messenger/Fameema
