ISLAMABAD      -    The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has decided to issue notices to potential non-tax filers after Eid-ul-Azha who had not filed their returns despite the fact that several chances were given.

The government had already identified potential non-filers through data received from sources. However, the FBR had given several opportunities to them to file their income tax returns by extending the deadline of filing returns.

“Although, we have received good response from the non-tax filers during the tax year 2018 as around 7,50,000 new people have come into tax net,” said an official of the FBR.

He further said that total number of taxpayers is still very low as compared to the overall population of the country.

The FBR had set a target to receive 4 million income tax returns by the end of December, 2019.

The FBR has received record 2.5 million income tax returns for Tax Year 2018, depicting over 47 percent growth in number of filers as compared to 1.7 million returns received last fiscal year.

The FBR would start issuing notices to potential non-tax filers from next week.

According to the officials, FBR has already compiled data of almost 8-10 million individuals who own a house larger than five hundred square yards or a vehicle over 1,000cc and bank accounts across the country.

The data will be used for issuance of notices in several phases. The distribution companies have already been requested to identify such people and also requested to consumers for converting bills to actual users.

It has been observed that several bills are being issued on the name of a single person.

The FBR wanted to bring more people into tax net to generate additional taxes to reach the mammoth annual tax collection target.

The PTI government had set Rs5.555 trillion tax collection target for the current fiscal year on the direction of International Monetary Fund (IMF). The FBR had already faced Rs14 billion shortfall in tax collection during first month (July) of the current fiscal year.

The FBR had collected Rs277 billion in July 2019 as against the target of Rs291 billion for the said month.

The FBR had witnessed shortfall in tax collection despite the government had introduced massive taxation measures in budget.

Similarly, it had started campaign to bring non-taxpayers into tax net. The IMF had set the first-quarter (Jul-Sept) revenue target at Rs1.070 trillion.