ISLAMABAD  -  The Federal Finance and Revenue Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb on Tuesday termed the tax award winners ‘national heroes’, urg­ing the countrymen to pay their due taxes be­ing responsible citizens. 

“You (the tax award winners) are really our national heroes. The entire nation and the country should follow you as a beacon of light,” the minister said while addressing the Tax Excellence Awards distribution ceremony here. The high taxpayers were awarded with the prizes by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.

Highlighting importance of tax collection in revenue generation, Aurangzeb said di­rect tax on domestic side and exports on the external front were levers of the growth and development. “In Pakistan’s case, the both flows have been raise-bound and therefore underwhelming, and redressing them on urgently basis is critical.” The finance min­ister reiterated a firm resolve of the gov­ernment for restructuring and digitisation of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), for which it was in process of appointing con­sultants “for design and implementation in term of end to end digitalisation”. He talked about bringing structural reforms, doing end-to-eng digitalisation and ensur­ing transparency in the tax-collection sys­tem, stressing, “We have to plug the leakag­es. There is a huge room for improvement in operational effectiveness of something rolled out few years back.”

Aurangzeb was of the view to restore the confidence of superior clients’ trust (high tax payers) in the government policies and trans­parency in the tax-collection system, which would help expand the tax-base. The minis­ter warned that the import-led and subsidy-supported businesses were not sustainable anymore and the country would have to ac­celerate export the led- growth to achieve the trajectory of sustainable growth.

He urged the private sector to continue im­proving productivity in industrial operations, assuring that the government would provide them best policy framework, competitive energy and IT developed skills, which would lead to the government to progress and pros­perity. Speaking on the occasion, FBR Chair­man Malik Amjed Zubair Tiwana expressed the confidence that the tax collection would increase due to effective policies of the gov­ernment. He said the prime minister always acknowledged the contribution of tax payers and exporters, and directed to solve their is­sues on urgent basis.