Finance Bill passed without major changes

The Finance Bill 2019 was passed in the Jatiya Sangsad on Saturday without major changes despite widespread criticism that easing investment of undisclosed money in the real estate and other sectors was immoral and the overall budget was tilted heavily towards the affluent people.

The government brought a change to the much- discussed proposal for legalising undisclosed money to buy flats, apartments and land by paying 10 per cent tax.

The undisclosed money holders, according to the change, now can buy flats and apartments, but not land, amid a fear that the price of land might shoot up in the land-scarce country.

Other changes made in the budget proposals include relaxing the proposal for 15 per cent tax on the reserve and retained earnings of publicly-listed companies against the observation by businessmen that retaining such proposals would discourage the flow of foreign direct investment.

Now, the listed companies will have to pay 10 per cent tax if they offer less cash dividend than stock dividend.

The proposal for 15 per cent tax on the listed companies having more than 50 per cent of their paid-up capital was also amended with conditions.

The government will take 10 per cent tax from the companies which will not offer 30 per cent of their profit as cash or stock dividend to the investors.

The original proposal for 5 per cent value added tax against the import of yarn on the basis of transacted value has been amended, which will allow the businessmen to pay Tk 4 as VAT against the import of a kilogram of yarn.

The opportunity of rebate in the much-talked about VAT law was only proposed for those who paid 15 per cent VAT.

The opportunity can now be availed also by the manufacturers who will agree to pay 15 per cent VAT though their products fall in categories of less than 15 per cent VAT.

Besides, an assurance was given to rationalise tax on imported paper, not for that produced in the country, in the interest of the local press industry.

Finance minister AHM Mustafa Kamal, who could not announce the full budget on June 13 in parliament due to dengue fever, appeared in parliament for the first time since then and said that he was yet to recover fully.

In a brief speech, the country’s first businessman-turned-finance minister hoped that the present budget would lead the country on the path to be a developed nation by 2041and would turn it as a loan-giving country in place of borrowing from others by 2030.

He also hoped that revenue to the tune of thousands of crores of taka could be mobilised if transparency can be established in bonded warehouse facility mostly enjoyed by export-oriented manufacturers.

Earlier, prime minister Sheikh Hasina who read out the remaining part of the budget speech on June 13 gave some amendment proposals while delivering her speech on the budgetary measures for the fiscal year 2019-20.

She also placed the Finance Bill on behalf of the ailing finance minister.

Eight opposition lawmakers demanded for people’s opinion on the bill with the argument that the majority parliament members could not play due roles to prepare the proposals.

They included Pir Fazlur Rahman, Rowshan Ara Mannan and Rumeen Farhana, who criticised the budgetary proposals as inadequate to address the growing income inequality.

They also berated the defaulted loans in the banking sector and capital flight to Swiss banks, Malaysia and Canada amid a dull discussion on the budget by treasury bench members.     

Pir Fazlur Rahman asked when the democracy would be restored.

Rowshan Ara Mannan noted that the country’s banks became a ‘bottomless basket’ due to unbridled corruption and loan scams in addition to chronic a defaulted loan culture because of government failure to rein in the wilful defaulters.

Rumeen Farhana said that the government was implementing an ‘extractive economy’ by hard-pressing the majority population for indirect taxes and giving benefits to affluent sections, who were reported to be responsible for capital flight to Swiss banks and investing money in second homes like Malaysia and Canada.

In reply, the PM said that election of BNP business leaders to the JS in the last general election enabled them to make deposits in Swiss banks.

 

News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net