Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha yesterday laid emphasis on modernisation of existing laws, changes of attitudes of taxmen, and giving power to the facilitators to keep the Alternative Dispute Resolution mechanism effective.
He said the NBR and income tax officials have to behave well with taxpayers because people expect a taxpayers friendly system and its officials to deal with.
The tax offices in Dhaka city are scattered so the taxpayers find it difficult to visit the offices, he said requesting the NBR to form exclusive tax offices to lessen suffering of taxpayers.
The chief justice was addressing a seminar on revenue suit management and alternative dispute resolution, held at a city hotel.
The National Board of Reveneu organised the event as part of its initiative to work together with stakeholders to settle legal cases that involve around Tk31,000 crore revenues.
According to the system, the NBR appoints the facilitators, which requires changes, he said.
“The facilitators will have to be trustworthy, but people may not trust on facilitators appointed by NBR. So the facilitators have to be appointed with consent of both parties and amendment of law will be required in this regard,” he said.
The chief justice also emphasised modernising the revenue collection related laws, expansion of tax base to upazila level, and strengthening of the Law Commission to ease backlog of cases.
The NBR will need to take initiative to appeal on stay order cases and faster settlement of such cases, SK Sinha said.
“We have opened up a section in the Supreme Court to settle tax-related cases but it is pending due to some bureaucratic complexities,” he said expecting that it will resolve soon.
He also asked the NBR officials to take steps to make appeal on cases that are facing stay orders for faster settlement of court cases.
Currently, a total of 24,572 cases are pending with the Supreme Court, which involve an amount of Tk30,947 crore revenues in income tax, customs duty and value added tax. NBR data shows that the pending revenue with court cases is 17.55% of the total revenue target for the current fiscal year 2015-16.
The government high officials, representatives from office of the attorney general, ADR facilitators, representatives from different trade bodies, tax lawyers, and taxpayers participated in the seminar.
Finance Minister AMA Muhith told the seminar that the ADR has failed to attract the taxpayers. He asked the retainers to attend the court cases for faster settlement of cases and to have update of cases.
“The NBR should have a cell in Supreme Court where at least one representative from NBR will always be there and this is my order,” he said.
“I do not attend my cases. So, how the cases will further proceed,” questioned Muhith.
The minister made the remark after questions were raised by attorney general Mahbubey Alam on absence of tax officials on the hearing.
Mahbubey Alam said the backlog of cases will continue as no NBR officials have visited his office for last seven years for pressurising him to settle the tax-related disputes.
“You have appointed three retainers, but none of them has yet visited my office.”
