ISLAMABAD: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has announced an incentive scheme for its officials in completion and timely submission of inquiry reports.
Documents seen by Profit state that the tax department has issued a letter to all officers of the Income Tax department and Pakistan Customs with regard to the incentives and punitive regimes for inquiry officers.
Under the incentive scheme, up to two basic salaries have been announced for the authorised officer for submitting inquiry report up to 60 days from receipt of letter nominating inquiry officer.
The FBR has decided the incentive while observing that most inquiry and authorized officers were delaying the finalisation of inquiries which lead to delay in conclusion of disciplinary proceedings against officials of FBR.
“This not only reflects poorly on the part of inquiry officer, authorized officer, authorised concerned but also puts the career of the accused officers in the state of limbo for longer periods,” the FBR said.
Therefore, with a view to encourage expeditious finalisation of inquiries and with a view to prevent delays in finalization of inquiries, the FBR chairman approved the incentive and punitive regime.
There would be two basic salaries as incentives if the inquiry officer will submit quality reports to the satisfaction of the authorized officer up to 60 days from receipt of the letter.
Similarly, there would be one and another 50 per cent basic salary on submitting reports up to 75 and 90 days, respectively whereas one basic salary has been announced if the inquiry report will be disposed of and passed an order from the date of receipt of reply within 30 days.
Furthermore, the FBR also introduced a punitive regime for delaying inquiry reports.
In this regard, the FBR said that the Internal Job Posting (IJP) allowance of inquiry officers, inquiry committee members, fact finding inquiry officers, and fact finding inquiry committee members shall be discontinued if they take more than 100 days to complete the inquiry.
The similar shall apply to authorised officers who take more than 40 days to decide on a judgment over an inquiry, and in case of proceedings against officers up to BS-16, the authority who takes more than 40 days for doing the needful.
The FBR said any excuse including requests for adjournment, non-availability of record etc. shall not be considered valid whereas time will only not count in case of a valid stay order from a court of competent jurisdiction.
This sure seems a good initiative, however tax incidences and their law have their own time frame, which is mostly dependent upon the judiciary.