GST collection in power bills: PHC seeks reason for taxing domestic consumers

Petition alleges authorities illegally collecting indirect taxes from houses

PESHAWAR:

The Peshawar High Court directed the Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda), Peshawar Electric Supply Company (Pesco) and the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) to explain the collection of general sales tax (GST) and TV tax from non-commercial consumers in their monthly electricity bills.

On Friday, the division bench of Justice Qaiser Rashid Khan and Justice Musarrat Hilali issued notices on a writ petition filed by Khalid Ayub through his counsel Zulfiqar Ali Khalil against the collection of such taxes.



Advocate Khalil informed the court that authorities are collecting taxes from mosques, schools and domestic consumers. He argued the breakdown of the bill should be 30% taxes and 70% should be charged for actual consumption.

“The situation (here) is completely the opposite as the government is charging 70% in taxes and 30% for actual consumption. This is completely against the law and is discriminatory towards law-abiding citizens,” said Khalil.

The court, after hearing preliminary arguments from the counsel of the petitioner, issued notices to FBR, Wapda and Pesco, asking them to explain the collection of such taxes from domestic consumers.

For the months of July, August and September, Pesco and Wapda were intentionally issuing illegal and unjust bills of excess amounts by charging GST and TV fees from domestic consumers, read the petition. It questioned under what authority the respondents categorised domestic consumers as commercial users and collected GST and other taxes.



The petition said in dozens of judgments since 2009, both the PHC and Supreme Court told respondents that Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa should not be treated like other provinces as its electricity comes from hydel sources and not fuel. Thus, the citizens should be given special discounted rates.

The petition also questioned how madrassas and mosques were being charged indirect taxes if they are not profit-making enterprises.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 18^th, 2014.