The country's ongoing economic pressure, high inflation, slowdown in imports and consumption expenditure, and stagnation in business activities have clearly affected the government's revenue collection this time.
The National Board of Revenue (NBR)'s revenue collection deficit stood at more than Tk104,533 crore in the first 10 months of the current FY26.
According to the NBR's updated report, the government's revenue collection target from July to April was Tk431,421.27 crore. Against this, income tax, VAT and customs collected Tk326,928.16 crore.
As a result, a huge deficit has been created compared to the target.
Economists and business leaders say that long-term high inflation has reduced people's purchasing power.
Due to the contraction in consumer spending, sales in the market have decreased, which has directly affected VAT collection.
At the same time, many companies are not able to use their full capacity due to the increase in production costs in the industrial sector. Due to this, income tax and import duty collection are not increasing as expected.
However, despite the large deficit, the NBR has been able to maintain some growth in revenue collection.
In the first 10 months of the current fiscal year, revenue collection has grown by 10.60%. The revenue collection amount was Tk295,200 crore in the same period of last fiscal.
A sector-wise analysis has shown that none of the three main sources - customs, VAT and income tax - has achieved the set target. Although there has been a growth of 8.87% in the customs sector, 11.1% in VAT and 11.59% in income tax.
Officials say that due to the foreign exchange crisis, the import control policy is in place, which has created pressure on import-dependent revenue collection. On the other hand, due to reduced demand in the market, VAT collection is not getting the desired momentum.
The picture for April was also disappointing. The revenue collection target for this month was Tk45,608.77 crore. In contrast, Tk39,060 crore was collected. Nevertheless, the growth was 6.71% compared to the same period last year.
Although the customs sector grew by 17.95% and income tax sector by 14.66% in April, the VAT sector grew by only 3.17%.
In other words, the weakness of consumption and purchasing power still remains one of the biggest challenges in revenue collection.
According to analysts, if this trend of revenue deficit continues, the government's dependence on budget implementation, development expenditure and bank loans may increase further.
At the same time, the pressure to implement various conditions of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) may also become a big challenge for the government.