Govt to finalize telecom tax for Budget 2018-19

Dr. Miftah Ismail, Prime Minister’s financial advisor has said that annual budget of 2018-19 will give due consideration to IT and telecommunication centers as these are very important sectors of the economy.

Earlier, Pakistan telecommunication companies approached the Ministry of Finance for the rationalization of telecom tax in the country. The companies also presented various proposals for government’s consideration for the upcoming budget of 2018-19.

Dr. Ismail held a high-level meeting to discuss the tax proposals submitted by the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunications. The meeting discussed that the telecom sector had shown rapid growth in the last many years. However, IT Sector had also started to pick up and efforts should be made to further improve the growth momentum.

It was decided that further consideration would be done by FBR & MoIT (Ministry of Information Technolgy) to finalize the appropriate telecom tax proposals in the budget 2018-19. Earlier this year, Senate Standing Committee for Information Technology and Telecommunication also showed concern over high telecom taxes imposed on the consumers by the government.

The telecom sector every year keeps an eye to rationalize tax in Pakistan. In the last few years, Pakistanis have paid RS. 200 billion taxes on using their mobile phones which most of the people were not bound to pay.