ISLAMABAD, Jan 18: The Central Board of Revenue (CBR) will move again a proposal to the prime minister for seeking autonomy in financial matters in execution of its policies.

An official told Dawn that this was decided in the board-in-council meeting presided over by CBR Chairman M. Abdullah Yousuf here on Wednesday.

According to the official, initially the proposal would be discussed with adviser to the prime minister on finance and revenue Dr Salman Shah in a presentation scheduled for Friday.

“The most striking benchmark would be granting of autonomy to the CBR in execution of its policies at the earliest as part of the reform of the tax administration,” the official said.

The proposed autonomy would enable the CBR to effectively execute its polices in respect of financial and administrative functions, make its own recruitment, postings and transfers and devise policies.

The official said that the World Bank had also proposed to grant autonomy to the CBR, which was linked as a condition with the funding to the reform process.

The meeting also finalized a strategy for presentation to the PM’s adviser on revenue collection during the second half of the current fiscal year and reform steps to be taken during the current fiscal year.

All medium taxpayers units (MTUs) will be converted into regional tax offices (RTOs) by the end of 2006, which will collect income tax and sales tax under the same roof. Around 60-70 taxpayers’ facilitation centres will be established across the country.

The RTOs are aimed at co-locating all income tax and sales tax work in 12 units and merging certain functions like registration, taxpayers’ facilitation, information processing and collection.

The reformed organization will be based on automation of the manual process, creation of data bank transaction and will launch an information system plan, which will provide quality services to taxpayers, reduce interaction between taxpayers and tax collectors, improve voluntary compliance and address the problem of tax evasion.