NBR to honour top VAT payers

The National Board of Revenue (NBR) will honour top nine VAT payers at national level and 110 at district level for their contribution to the state coffers.

The NBR selected the companies in three categories—production, service and business.

Gallerie Apex, Aarong and Mustafa Mart are the top three VAT payers in the business category.

RTV, Chowdhury Tea Warehouse and Bangladesh Rural Electrification Board will be awarded in the service category.

State-owned Titas Gas Field, Kailashtila Gas Field and Rashidpur Condensate Fractionation plant will be awarded in the production category.

The NBR will hand over the awards at a programme on Sunday on the occasion of National VAT Day, which is part of a weeklong programme starting today.

A procession from the NBR headquarters to the National Press Club will be organised today. State Minister for Finance MA Mannan will inaugurate the march.

This was disclosed at a media briefing held at the NBR office in Dhaka.

NBR Chairman Md Nojibur Rahman said electronic cash register programme of the revenue board is facing implementation challenges due to different complexities.

"Many companies are dodging the ECR transaction through ill-practices making the system ineffective."

The NBR's intelligence offices have already identified the dodgers and imposed penalty on them, Rahman said.

The NBR will check the scope of such revenue leakages through the online VAT project making all transactions automated, which will help resolve the hassles on payment and collections of VAT.

Rahman alleged that honest VAT officials are being harassed by a section of businesses. "As a result, they can't perform their duty properly."

"We will keep close contact with the Anticorruption Commission, Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Information Commission to ensure access to information and maintain smooth activity," Rahman said.

The new VAT and supplementary duty law will come into effect from July 1 next year to make the system automated.

VAT is a crucial income source for the government, accounting for more than 20 percent of the budget's revenue generation.

The government aims to earn Tk 44,159 crore in VAT in fiscal 2015-16 to meet its total revenue target of Tk Tk 208,770 crore.