Karachi: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has notified previously undeclared real estate assets worth PKR 350 billion under the tax amnesty scheme introduced in December 2016, a news source reported. The federal institution also made tax recoveries worth PKR 10.52 billion between December 2016 and June 2019.
The officials concerned stated that several individuals provided the details of their properties under the tax amnesty scheme launched through the Income Tax (Fourth Amendment) Act 2016; which created Section 236W of the Income Tax Ordinance 2001. This provision allowed the individuals to pay only 3% of the tax for registering their illegal wealth parked in the property marketplace.
The incumbent government recently extinguished the said scheme through the Finance Act 2019, enforced on July 1.
An FBR official revealed that the amendment allowed each individual – liable to register, record, or attest transfer of immovable property – to pay tax at a rate of 3% of the difference between the FBR value of the property and the value recorded by the authority registering or attesting the transfer. He added that this was applicable when the FBR value was more than the recorded value.
The FBR official stated that by paying this percentage of the difference, the property buyer was exempted from explaining the source of the difference of amount between the FBR and recorded values of the property.
In a statement, the tax authority has revealed that now the amnesty has been omitted, purchasers will have to explain the source of investment in the property up to the FBR’s value of it. The statement added that previously, buyers were only required to explain the source of investment to the extent of the recorded value of the property.
