CGA finds huge gap in NBR revenue figure

A file photo shows National Board of Revenue headquarters in Dhaka. Gap in the figures of revenue collected by the NBR and calculated by the Office of the Controller General of Accounts has been widening over the years due to problems in compilation and documentation methods followed by the two agencies of the government. — New Age photo

Gap in the figures of revenue collected by the National Board of Revenue and calculated by the Office of the Controller General of Accounts has been widening over the years due to problems in compilation and documentation methods followed by the two agencies of the government.
The difference in revenue accounts between the two agencies increased by around five times and stood at up to Tk 13,700 crore in the last fiscal year 2014-2015 from the Tk 2,923 crore five years ago in the FY2010-2011.
The gap created as the CGA office could not find any documents against the amount which is more than 10 per cent of the total reported revenue collection by the NBR.
According to the calculation of the revenue board, it collected Tk 1,36,723 crore in the year.
On the other hand, CGA office claimed that the revenue collection was between Tk 1,23,054 crore and Tk 1,23,990 crore in the year.
According to the reports of the CGA and the revenue board, the gap was Tk 3,429 crore in FY 2012, Tk 5,673 crore in FY 13 and Tk 9,399 crore in FY 14.
Officials of the revenue board said that a mismatch might be created because of mainly double counting of same revenue by two NBR field offices, duplication of treasury challans in tax offices and delay in receiving pay orders by CGA office.
The CGA office calculates revenue collection based on documents including treasury challan and pay orders and it adds revenue collection in its accounting system only after receiving the documents.
On the other hand, tax officials sometimes calculate revenue figure based on the report from various sources including treasury challan, pay orders, book adjustment, memo and notifications issued by different government organisations.
Even sometimes they calculate the revenue figure without challan or any other documents while some field offices may have exaggerated the actual collection to fulfil their collection target set by the revenue board.
NBR officials said that different government agencies furnish reports about income tax and value-added tax deducted at source to the revenue board without documents.
Two separate field offices also count same amount of
taxes in their calculation as monitoring office and collection office, causing double counting.
CGA office also does not show the travel tax in its calculation and deducts the amount the NBR pays back to the taxpayers as refund.
Officials and experts said the difference in the figure of revenue accounts weakens the government’s fiscal policy and fiscal framework as the government prepares the documents based on the estimation of revenue collection.
They also said that such mismatch might also create chance of misuse of revenue earnings by the taxmen.
The Centre for Policy Dialogue senior research fellow Towfiqul Islam Khan told New Age on Wednesday that Tk 13,700 crore mismatch in revenue accounts is not negligible in any way as such mismatch may confuse the policymakers while preparing fiscal policy and fiscal framework.
The revenue board should spot the reasons and reconcile it with the CGA calculation for better policy formulation, he said.
Officials of the revenue board said that the NBR took initiative for reconciliation of the gap and had been holding meetings with the CGA office.