ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has directed the authorities to immediately create a dashboard to monitor the ongoing digitisation of the Federal Board of Revenue to prevent tax evasion.

Chairing a meeting to review the taxation reforms process, the PM instructed to bring the taxable non-filers into the tax net and revoke the discretionary powers of the customs appraisers and sought an implementation report from the FBR chairman within 24 hours.

During the briefing on FBR’s digitisation, the meeting was informed that 4.5 million taxable individuals who were not part of the tax net had been identified.

The meeting was informed that, consequent to the government’s measures, over 300,000 individuals filed their tax returns within a few weeks. Besides, 4,000 companies’ refunds had been stopped during the last two weeks following the detection of under-invoicing and forged sales tax refunds.

Published in Dawn, July 6th, 2024