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Taxes and Taxes
Sometime back I requested the government through your columns to reimburse the service charges recovered from the National Savings Scheme’s Bahbood and Pensioners’ Account holders who had to encash their deposits before February 2nd 2009 to reinvest them for higher profit rates. If the huge spate of mail that I received in this respect is any indication of the funds involved then those would be colossal. Some of the mailers pointed out certain other discreet and subtle ways of the government collecting unjustifiable huge revenue from the people which we all simply ignore. These are:-
1. Non-restoration of the commuted pension after completion of the commutation period as was the practice before but taken away by Shaukat Aziz.
2. Payment of withholding tax (advance Income Tax) on utility bills like PTCL land phones, Electricity, Gas, all Mobile Cell phones bills and the meager bank accounts etc. from all including those who do not fall in taxable bracket and as such cannot get it adjusted or refunded through their IT returns.
3. Payment of PTV monthly fees through electricity bills, whereas more than 90 percent of the population has cable connection and pay for it.
It is hoped that the SC while hearing the petition about the huge tax on the petrol & diesel prices being charged by the government would also take suo moto notice of such unjustifiable revenue collection to provide relief to the common who pins great hopes now on the independent judiciary.
Truly
Col. Riaz Jafri (Retd)
30, Westridge-1
Rawalpindi 46000
Tel: (051) 5465 3344
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