Debt defaulters and tax burden
By
Md. Arif Sadeq, Department of English, University of Dhaka
29 June 2004, 18:00 PM
The national budget, which has to do a lot to influence peoples' life standard, for the forthcoming fiscal year has recently been passed. The main opposition party, as usual, has rejected the proposed budget calling it a futile and over-ambitious one. No doubt, the budget is a challenging one which reflects the honourable finance minister's high confidence and over dependence on the taxes of middle class people who have been struggling to cope up with the rising prices of daily commodities. Though in the budget the taxes on some of the items have been reduced most of the greedy dealers hardly reduce the retail prices to get maximum benefits from the customers. But on the other hand, such kind of dealers take no time in increasing the prices of those items newly taxed in the proposed budget even if those very products have been stored for a long time before the budget was passed. The authorities hardly take stern actions against them to control such an inhuman and dishonest practice. As a result, common consumers do not get the benefit of cut and reduction of taxes on daily commodities . However, the imposition of various taxes on public only help to further enhance the sufferings of the helpless people. In this connection, I would like to ask the honourable minister about the debt defaulters who could add a significant amount to the treasury of the government: what action is he going to take against the big fish ? Will they go scot-free while majority of the people have to take the unbearable burden on their weak shoulders? Had the government shown an unbending attitude to these millionaires to retrieve the huge amount of money, it would not have to impose any more taxes on public services. Another potential source could be the 'Zakat fund' which is enriched by the huge amount of money contributed by the affluent people. Actually, it is a very important duty of the government to ensure people's contribution to the 'Zakat fund'Now it is high time to detect and utilise every potential source from within the country to get out of the noose of foreign aid.
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