KARACHI: In an effort to increase the revenue bracket, Pakistan’s tax administration announced on Thursday that it had disabled 210,000 SIM cards belonging to subscribers who had not submitted tax filings.
Out of the almost 240 million people, just 5.2 million submitted income tax forms in 2022. After the decree was approved in April, the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) ordered the telecommunications authority to restrict the connections of 210,000 SIM cards. Later, the board said that 62,000 of the SIM cards had been reinstated.
“Those who have paid their taxes have their SIMs unblocked,” stated Bakhtiar Muhammad, a public relations representative for FBR. “No one shows up willingly to pay taxes. We must find methods for the public to pay their taxes,” he continued. The telecoms regulator reports that there are four telecom service providers and over 192 million cellular users in the nation.
An anonymous representative of one of the four telecom companies told AFP that “access to telecom services is a basic human right and essential for many other fundamental services, including access to information, education, and emergency services.We are in dialogue with the authorities, convincing them to use technology to help increase tax collection, as abrupt measures could disrupt the provision of these critical services,” they stated.
The nation in South Asia is beset by an economy that is mostly undocumented, which makes it difficult for it to grow its pitifully small income base.In an effort to assist balance its books, the government has been pressuring the IMF for more loans, but the organization prefers that Islamabad take more steps to mobilize its own resources.
“This is a ridiculous action. “Not every SIM owner makes enough money to be considered a tax payer,People’s livelihoods are tied to their phones, this is an overreach,” she stated. In a letter sent in June to the Ministry of Information Technology, the four telecoms companies expressed concern that the new tax laws targeting cellphone users who do not file taxes were “impractical” and “non-workable” and would deter international investment.
