Government's revenue authority enforced Monday a freeze on all bank accounts of telecom-operator Robi Axiata Limited for alleged tax-dodging.
The National Board of Revenue (NBR) claims Tk 187 million in unpaid value-added tax (VAT) and supplementary duty (SD), officials said.
Large Taxpayers Unit (LTU) under the VAT wing of the NBR sent in instructions to Managing Directors (MDs) of the commercial banks to freeze Robi's bank accounts for three days, they added.
LTU commissioner Md Matiur Rahman dispatched the letters to the commercial banks, in their last resort to realise the default taxes.
As per the existing law, it is incumbent upon the commercial banks to go by the NBR instructions on this matter of realising overdue government revenue.
And all of the bank accounts of the mobile-phone operator across the country have been frozen already in quick action at NBR directive, banking sources said.
The LTU claimed VAT 'evasion' on account of unpaid SD as per trial balance worth Tk 100 million, VAT on space and establishment rent worth Tk 67 million, SIM (subscriber identity module) tax Tk 8.1 million and VAT on inter-connection-service charge of the Bangladesh Telecommunications Company Limited (BTCL) worth Tk 8.1 million.
Talking to the FE Monday, Ekram Kabir, vice president (communication and corporate responsibility) of Robi said it is not an evasion, but dispute.
"Although there was an instruction of court to sit for a hearing on the claim, the company did not get the opportunity before the taking of such steps," he said.
Bodiuzzaman Munshi, deputy commissioner of the LTU, said there is no scope to evade government's due revenues.
"All other operators are paying the VAT and SD on this head, except for Robi," he said.
The LTU went on such action as per section 26 (4) of the VAT law 1991.
Officials said in case of non-payment of the due VAT and SD within those three days, the time of suspension on the bank-account operation might be extended.
As per law, the VAT authority could not freeze bank accounts for unlimited period.
Sources said the Robi will be able to clear the due VAT and SD from the frozen accounts with approval from the NBR.
In the letter, the LTU said a team of the unit visited the Robi corporate office on February 7, 2018 and collected its trial balance (for the month of December 2017), summary of site and space rent (for July 2017 to December 2017), summary of SIM sales (during the period of October 2017 to January 2018) and summary invoice to BTCL (PSTN) (for the period of January 2017 to December 2017.
The team has taken official seal of the representatives of the company on tax, fiscal compliance and software on the collected documents.
According to the 1991 VAT law, the VAT authority is empowered to take steps for freezing bank accounts of a VAT-registered company for a certain period in case of detection of evasion or other irregularities on the basis of data, documents or other samples.
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