ISLAMABAD – The caretaker government on Wednesday appointed Ansar Javed (Grade-22 officer of Inland Revenue Service) the new chairman of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) with immediate effect.
“In pursuance of the Establishment Division’s notification issued on Wednesday, Ansar Javed has assumed the charge of his office, stated the notification. Three names, Ansr Javed of Inland Revenue Service (IRS), Shahid Rahim Sheikh of Custom Group and Malik Samad of Inland Revenue Service (IRS) were forwarded to Caretaker Prime Minister Mir Hazar Khan Khoso for appointment as the FBR chairman after the suspension of Ali Arshad Hakeem by the Islamabad High Court (IHC). Senior officers of the IRS had challenged the appointment of Ali Arshad Hakeem in the IHC as the FBR chairman.
The prime minister appointed Ansar Javed as the new FBR chairman. Ansar Javed has worked on key positions, including chief commissioner inland revenue, Large Taxpayers Unit Lahore, director general, Directorate General of Intelligence and Investigation (Inland Revenue) Islamabad.
Apart from other taxation issues, the new FBR chairman would face a massive revenue collection target in last three months of the current financial year as the tax department is struggling to achieve the revenue collection target during the ongoing financial year 2012-2013. The FBR has to collect Rs 782 billion during the last quarter (April-June) of the current fiscal year to meet the revised target of Rs 2,126 billion, which is challenging for the tax department at the time when the general elections are around the corner.
The FBR has provisionally collected Rs 1,344 billion during the nine months (July-March) of the present financial year 2012-2013 as against Rs 1,260 billion in the corresponding period of the last year, showing an increase of 6.7 percent well below the 23.7% increase needed to meet the budget targets. Similarly, the FBR would devise a strategy to increase the revenue collection in the last three months and in the upcoming financial year 2013-2014.
It is worth mentioning here that the FBR has twice revised the revenue collection target during the ongoing financial year 2012-2013 due to poor performance of the tax department. Earlier, the FBR revised the budgetary revenue target to Rs 2,231 billion from Rs 2,381 billion for the current fiscal year, showing a shortfall of Rs 150 billion. Later, the FBR further revised the tax collection target to Rs.2126 billion during the ongoing fiscal year 2012-2013. – Nation
