Dhaka: About 1.25 lakh companies registered with Registrar of Joint Stock Companies and Firms(RJSC) do not pay taxes to the government which is about 77 percent.
This is a huge evasion of the government taxes. This information was confirmed by National Board of Revenue sources. According to the information of the Financial Reporting Council(FRC) the number of the registered companies across the country is three lakhs. The number of the registered companies and organizations with RJSC is 213500 while the number of only companies is 165500. Of these the number of government is 3500 and the number of private companies is 162000. But the number of return submitted in NBR is 55 thousand companies which is only 23 percent. 110500 companies or 77 percent companies did not submit return to NBR. But no visible action was taken against the defaulter companies.
Economists and the concerned said that every year the size of the budget is increasing for which the amount of revenue is also increasing in NBR. To increase revenue government is imposing direct and indirect taxes on common people. But the government is not giving its attention to this large sector which is evading taxes years together. The matter should be investigated into for the interest of revenue earnings. The good governance of the revenue sector is also related with it.
Former chairman of NBR Abdul Mazid told Barta24.com that the NBR should look into the matter rather imposing the heavy burden of taxes on the common people. This will help to expand the tax net as well as the people will be interested to pay tax. So actions should be taken soon against these default companies.
Former adviser to the care taker government DR. AB MIrza Azizul Islam told Barta24.com the NBR should look into the matter to increase the revenue. The FRC can play a role in identifying this type of irregularities.
NBR chairman Moshrraf Hossain Bhuyia told Barta24.com that to expand the tax net we are conducting survey in the cities and towns. We are identifying those who are not paying taxes though able to pay taxes. After budget announcement rapid actions will be taken against them.
It is learnt from NBR sources that auditing of the registered companies is mandatory at the submission of tax return. In this case the audit must be done by the government approved 154 chartered account firms. No firm outside this approved list is allowed to audit any company. As per information available from the CA firms that audit accounts of 22 thousand companies were done in last year. But in NBR document there are proofs of submitting returns by 55 thousand companies during the same period.