our Staff Reporter PESHAWAR Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KPCCI) while presenting their proposals for the fiscal year 2011-12, have demanded of the government to abolish Capital Value Tax (CVT) from the industrial sector. In their budget proposals KPCCI office bearers including its president Usman Bashir Bilour, Chairman standing committee Zahid Shinwari, Muhammmad Ishaq and current vice presidents of chamber Javed Akhtar and Sohail Hashmat maintained that the government levied Capital Value Tax on industrial sector and the tax is meant for commercial and residential areas but this tax is also being collected on industrial plots and demanded that CVT should be abolished from the industrial sector. We are against the imposition of wealth tax because it is a punitive tax that penalises savings and investment and further more, this is a tax that is levied on assets that have been created from money on which tax is already paid. The developed countries except France and India, do not tax wealth because it is construed as taxing capital formation, asset building and national savings, they said. Regarding withholding tax, KPCCI office bearers said that government must pay attention to eliminate advance tax/withholding tax in the coming budget adding that however if the govt feels any set back in collection of funds, it should be eliminated in phases. They further said that withholding tax on import is a sort of double Taxation (tax on tax), which is totally unjustified and unfair, which also increases the cost of industrial raw materials. The WHT should be calculated on the value of goods, excluding sales tax at import stage and it should not be calculated on the basis of duty paid value by amending section 148(9) of Income Tax Ordinance, they added. The procedure of income tax refund should be rationalized and should be modeled after sales tax refund procedure; KPCCI suggested adding that this will not only reduce the difficulties of the taxpayers but will also improve the FBR credibility. The KPCCI leaders further said that commencement of the centralized system for issuance of NTN has worsened the process instead of facilitating the taxpayers adding that FBR has provided a facility to apply for NTN both electronically and manually but both the options do not help the taxpayers in getting the NTN within the prescribed period of 48 hours. The registration process, which is supposed to be done in hours, has been halted for months because of the applications galore. The situation is so much deplorable that even for minor alteration or changes in the existing NTN certificates, taxpayers have to undergo immense hardships and difficulties. Delays in the issuance of NTNs and lack of coordination between the FBR, Islamabad and field offices, like Regional Tax Offices and Large Taxpayers Units, are not only depriving taxpayers from getting the tax number within the prescribed time but it also deprives the national exchequer from billions of rupees in revenue along with tax returns. Under the laid down conditions by the FBR no taxpayer could get sales tax registration without NTN registration. This means that no business establishment could start functioning till it gets NTN and thereafter sales tax registration. This pathetic condition of the FBR and its field offices at the 1st step (i.e. issuance of NTN), also raises concerns regarding the smooth functioning/handling of detailed assessment procedures.