People with monthly salary of Tk16,000 and above must register with electronic taxpayers identification number (eTIN) from upcoming fiscal year 2016-17, a move taken by the government to increase the tax base.
With the Finance Bill 2016, the government has made registration with eTIN mandatory for all salaried individuals- both government and private company officials- having the said amount.
According to the bill, the eTIN will be made mandatory for employees of the government or an authority, corporation, body or units of the government or formed by any law, order or instrument being in force, if the employee, at any time in the income year, draws salary at a scale of grade 10 or basic salary of Tk16,000 or above.
However, such marginal taxpayers do not need to worry much as not all those eTIN holders will have to submit their income tax return- a horror for many taxpayers.
Although the eTIN was mandatory for people with Tk16,000 monthly basic income, however, submission of income tax return was made mandatory only for people with annual income of above Tk2.50 lakh, officials of the National Board of Revenue (NBR) said.
They said the government made eTIN mandatory for such people to boost its revenue income by expanding the tax base for marginal taxpayers.
Currently, the number of income taxpayers is not satisfactory in the country. According to NBR, at least seven million people earn enough to pay taxes. Only some, little over 1.8 million, have tax identification numbers (TINs).
Among them, only 12 lakh taxpayers, which is less than 1% of the population, submit their income tax returns regularly.
The number should be higher in consideration of the size of population, officials said.
The latest move to introduce eTIN for individuals with salaries above Tk16,000 will also help the government reach its target of raising the number of taxpayers to 15lakh from existing 12 lakh by next one year, officials added.
Thursday, June 04, 2026
