Metro built with your taxes: Mustafa Kamal

Metro rail is a great achievement and was built with citizens’ taxes, Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal said Wednesday.

Talking about the metro rail inauguration, he said the prime minister is giving the nation gifts one after another. “It was built with your [citizens’] taxes. We will meet the expectations of Vision 2041.”

He was addressing a programme arranged at Officer’s Club Dhaka to award top taxpayers. He handed over tax cards and certificates while the revenue board chairman, Abu Hena Md Rahmatul Muneem, presided over the event.

“Paying taxes is not only a duty but is also good work, which helps the marginalised people. Keep up the good work. We can work to help the marginalised groups move ahead,” Kamal said.

The minister said the revenue sector had seen huge reforms in the last ten years and the revenue board saw 14-15 per cent growth yearly. “But we still lag far behind the developed countries.”

Stressing the simplification of paying taxes, Muneem said the National Board of Revenue (NBR) is working to eliminate the fear of paying taxes.

He said the NBR is detecting tax evasion through secondary data-based audits. “This helps reduce arbitrariness while audit fears increase documented audits.”

Senior Secretary of the Finance Division Fatima Yasmin, who was the special guest at the programme, said the tax-to-GDP ratio should be increased to at least 12 per cent to continue the ongoing development work and projects in the country.

Focusing on enhancing the awareness of paying taxes among the public, she said, “You get electricity and gas at subsidised rates while subsidies are paid from your [citizens’] taxes.” She also said Bangladesh needs to increase the number of taxpayers to 1.80 crore to become a developed country.

“Currently, our tax-to-GDP ratio is 8.5 per cent, which is the least among Asian countries. Also, it does not match the pace of our development activities.”

The NBR honoured 141 top taxpayers at the event. Of them, 76 were awarded in the individual category, 53 in the company category, and 12 in other categories for paying the highest amount of taxes for the 2021-22 fiscal year.

The government selected the top taxpayers as per the amended national tax card policy 2010.

NBR Member (tax administration and HRM) Shahin Akter said the revenue board had extended the return submission deadline till January 1.

The previous deadline was December 31. As the last two days of the year are weekly holidays, the deadline was extended by a day.

Earlier, on November 30, the NBR extended the deadline by a month in response to requests from various quarters.