As a first step, FBR’s Legal Wing has implemented Litigation Management System (LMS) in all Inland Revenue field formations. Litigation Management System, indigenously developed by Legal Wing with the help of Pakistan Revenue Automation Ltd. (PRAL), is an application of Integrated Tax Management System (ITMS). FBR plans to extend this System application to Pakistan Customs field offices as well. This System aims at improving the process of filing of References, in High Courts and Civil Petitions for Leave to Appeal (CPLAs) proposals etc. in Supreme Court of Pakistan, and to effectively monitor the progress/results of litigation. This System ultimately would be able to develop a compatible data base at FBR (HQs) for the litigated cases. It will also enhance the capacity of human resource deployed at various field formations coupled with improving the quality of representation before the courts of law. Furthermore, this System would enable senior management with instant access to position on litigated cases and bring in improvement in Tax-Legal System of FBR.
Training exercise on Litigation Management System (LMS) at Directorate of Training and Research Lahore, Islamabad and at Regional Tax Office-III Karachi and Multan, have been completed. It was training cum practice sessions for streamlining the data entry in the Litigation Management System software. Additional Commissioners, Deputy Commissioners, Assistant Commissioners, Inland Revenue Officers, Auditors, Inspectors, Stenos, DBAs, KPOs, UDCs and LDCs of Large Taxpayers Units Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad, and Regional Tax Offices I, II&III Karachi, I&II Lahore, Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Multan, Sialkot, Bahawalpur, Hyderabad, Quetta, Abbotabad, Peshawar, Sargodha and Sukkur, participated in this training cum practice activity. In this training activity held at Lahore, Karachi Multan and Islamabad, a total no. of 191 officers / officials were trained as ‘Master Trainers’ for streamlining the litigation data entry and its updation in the System.
Software on Appeal Management and Processing System (AMAPS), another extended application of ITMS, has been prepared with the help of PRAL and implemented in the offices of Commissioners Inland Revenue (Appeals) throughout the country. Through this System, Cause Lists, Appeal Registers, Monthly Performance Reports and other analysis, related to functions of Commissioners Inland Revenue (Appeals) can be seen from FBR (HQs).The daily cause lists have also been linked by the field formations meaning thereby that the field officers now are able to see online the fixation of cases before the Commissioners Inland Revenue (Appeal) on daily basis.
‘Legal Informatics’ another application of ITMS is under process. Through this System field formations would be able to access the important case laws related to Supreme Court High Courts, Appellate Tribunals and Federal Tax Ombudsman.
Reorganization of the first appellate forum has been carried out and the workload rationalized. As a result of this re-organization, there are 16 Commissioners Inland Revenue (Appeals) and 3 Collectors of Customs (Appeals) report to Member Legal.
In Civil Appeals/CPLAs and Writ Petitions before various benches of High Courts and Supreme Court of Pakistan, several cases have been represented and defended successfully.
Registration of FBR Foundation as a separate legal entity for carrying out welfare activities for the in-service and retired employees and their dependents has been registered.
Amendments of curative nature in tax laws have been proposed for their incorporation in the Finance Bill, 2010, 2011, and 2012.
Three Regional Task Forces were constituted at Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad which were given mandate and jurisdiction to speed up the process of liquidation of court cases. As a result of these efforts, Special Tax Benches has been constituted in Lahore High Court, Lahore and fixation of cases at Sind High Court, Karachi and Islamabad High Court, has also started.
System of Electronic communication between Federal Tax Ombudsman, FBR (HQs) and field offices has been introduced in collaboration with PRAL by providing secured e-mail access to each field office and FBR (HQs) to curtail the time involved in making compliance to the directions of the Federal Tax Ombudsman.
