PTI government to table mini budget today
islamabad — The newly-elected PTI-led government has decided to present a mini-budget for the remaining nine months of the fiscal year of 2018-19 on Friday.
According to media reports, the decision was made during a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Imran Khan in Islamabad on Wednesday.
The presentation of an amended budget is aimed at streamlining the government’s economic policies in line with the major economic indicators and the introduction of policies and steps to increase government’s revenues to help it overcome the budget and trade deficits, Xinhua news agency reported.
The new government is expected to make amends to the popular Tax Amnesty Scheme, which was launched by the previous government
earlier this year. Moreover, the incumbent economic managers are also likely to change the tax exemption annual slab fromRs1.2 million to Rs0.8 million.
According to a report aired by a TV channel, the prices of more than 400 products are expected to increase under the proposals made by economic managers.
The PTI-led government is also
considering imposing regulatory duties on 150 luxury products and fixing the income tax ratio to the June 30 level.
The government has decided to cut down the size of the federal development programme.
The government is planning to increase additional customs duty by 1 per cent on over 5000 imported items. Besides generating about Rs40 billion in taxes, the measure could cut the import bill by around $1 billion.
In order to curb imports, the government was also considering reducing the age limit of imported cars from three years to two years and of jeeps from five years to three years.
The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has suggested imposition of new taxes to the tune of Rs300 billion and also proposed an increase in the income tax of the salaried class.
The previous PML-N government had given tax assumption to those with an annual income of Rs1.2 million but now the government is considering imposing tax on those earning Rs400,000 annually. —