Filers, Non-Filers and the Property Rights in Pakistan

There was a joke about Gen Zia and Noor Jahan in which understandably Gen Zia was meant to be punished. But it appeared he was rather being rewarded and Noor Jahan was being meted out a punishment.

The same is the case of Filers and Non-Filers.
The government wants to punish the Non-Filers, but in reality it’s the opposite: the punishment is being meted out to the Filers.

The latest case of such punishment, from the standpoint of the government, meant to be meted out to the Non-Filers is in reality a punishment being meted out to the Filers.

And that’s sort of a clearance certificate every Filer is required to obtain from the FBR before he/she sells a property registered in his/her name.

That’s another dent in the already fragile property rights in Pakistan.…

PML-N’s Bhatta or withholding tax

It seems the present dispensation of PML-N believes in no principles of taxation. It’s just there to extort whatever amount of taxes the Federal Board of Revenue may extort from the citizens in the form of bribes and in the name of taxes: of course, for itself as well as for the government.
However, the principles of taxation, the PML-N may be supposed to believe in, manifest themselves in the measures it announces in the budget and then obtains their approval from the parliament. That much is least controversial; what is controversial is the way the new taxes are conceived and implemented. As a rule, it’s the income or the consumption which is universally taxed. Also, the just taxation is not spending-driven, which certainly is the case as far as the PML-N government’s economic policies are concerned.
No doubt, there are countless