Govt to recover unpaid taxes from Ncell

Revenue Secretary of Finance Ministry Shishir Kumar Dhungana has assured that the government would recover remaining dues relating to outstanding capital gain taxes from Ncell within the current fiscal year.

"Ncell has promised to clear all dues in four installments. Now, we can recover the dues and this happens within this FY," he said responding to queries raised by lawmakers in the meeting of the Public Accounts Committee of the House of Representatives on Sunday.

Earlier, the Large Taxpayers’ Office approached the Ncell to pay Rs 62.6 billion in fine and capital gain taxes unpaid during the handing over of the then Mero Mobile, a privately owned mobile network operator, to the administration of Ncell.

However, Ncell moved the Supreme Court (SC) against the move of the authorities. The apex court however asked the government to recover only the dues worth Rs 46 billion from Ncell stating that a company was not held responsible to clear dues remained unpaid during the handing over of the Ncell administration to a new company.

Of the unpaid dues determined by the SC, Ncell on June 4, 2017 paid Rs 23.5 billion, of which, Ncell has paid Rs 4.5 billion, pledging to clear remaining dues in installments.