KATHMANDU: The tax net continues to expand. According to the Ministry of Finance, 433,000 new taxpayers have been added as of the Nepali month of Magh in the current fiscal year.
A total of 426,330 taxpayers who have obtained permanent account numbers (PANs) were added until Magh of the fiscal year 2080/81 BS, while the number of new taxpayers during the same period of the current fiscal year reached 433,703.
The ministry reports that the total number of taxpayers with permanent account numbers has now reached 6,659,836.
Of these, 30.2% hold commercial PANs, 0.5% are from tax collection agencies, and 69.3% have personal PANs.
As of the review period, the number of taxpayers registered for Value Added Tax (VAT) has reached 341,716, while 123,132 taxpayers are registered for excise duty.
While the number of taxpayers has grown significantly following the budget announcement, government revenue has not shown encouraging growth.
The government has set a revenue target of 1,419 billion rupees for the current fiscal year, but data from the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General indicates that only 51% of this target, or 737 billion rupees, has been collected by Chaitra 8.
This has resulted in the government’s budget deficit surpassing 1 trillion rupees by this period.
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