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National Board of Revenue (NBR) chairman Md Abdur Rahman Khan on Sunday categorically said his organisation will not hesitate to take any decision for the benefit of the country.
“We are moving towards that direction,” he said while holding a pre-budget discussion with the Newspapers Owners’ Association of Bangladesh (NOAB) at the NBR office in Dhaka.
He mentioned that there are three reasons behind the lower tax-GDP ratio in the country. These are: huge number of tax exemptions and their misuse, short tax net for income tax and value-added tax (VAT) and operational inefficiency.
The NBR chief said that due to the tax exemption culture, the NBR gives away the same amount of money that it collects by taxation.
"We do not want to incur tax expenditure freshly,” he said.
Abdur Rahman Khan said that if anyone makes a small profit, then that person will pay a lower tax, which is the main ethos of the tax administration. He also said that due to the lack of automation, the NBR is still doing many of its duties manually.
While placing a budget proposal for the NOAB, its president AK Azad demanded reducing import duty on newsprint to two per cent, imposing VAT at 5 per cent instead of 15 per cent and writing off corporate tax or making it nominal in the newspaper industry, considering it a service industry.
Prothom Alo Editor Matiur Rahman and The Financial Express Editor Shamsul Huq Zahid also spoke.