The National Board of Revenue (NBR) has issued directives to strengthen the activities of its field-level Intelligence and Investigation Cells (IICs) in a bid to expedite the recovery of evaded taxes and boost overall revenue collection.
According to an official circular from the Office of the NBR Member (Tax Audit, Intelligence and Investigation), each tax zone has been instructed to form dedicated intelligence and investigation teams.
The directive outlines the structure, operational procedures, reporting framework and approval process for initiating recovery actions based on the teams’ findings.
The IIC teams will launch investigations based on various sources of intelligence, including complaints of tax evasion, information published in print and electronic media, inconsistencies in income tax records or registers, evidence of tampering or erasure, unusual declarations of tax-free income, or discrepancies between declared taxable income and assets.
If concrete evidence of tax evasion is identified during the investigation, the team will submit a detailed report to the respective Intelligence and Investigation Committee for approval to initiate recovery proceedings.
Upon verification of the findings, the committee will authorise legal measures to recover the evaded revenue.
The NBR has also instructed each tax commissionerate to submit monthly reports detailing the additional tax claims and collections generated from intelligence and investigation activities. The reports must reach the NBR by the 10th of each month.
The revenue authority, in a press release, expressed optimism that strengthening the operations of the Intelligence and Investigation Cells will not only facilitate the recovery of evaded taxes but also discourage tax evasion and foster a culture of compliance and transparency within the country’s tax system.
Meanwhile, the revenue collection of the National Board of Revenue (NBR) is still behind the target for August, the second month of the current fiscal, maintaining its trend like the first month of the fiscal.
In August, the overall revenue collection for the NBR suffered some Tk 3,715.3 crore, according to the data released by the NBR.
It said that the overall collection target for the revenue collecting authority was Tk 30,889.30 crore, while the collection was Tk 27,174 crore.
The revenue collection in the same month of the previous 2024-2025 fiscal year was Tk 23,089.37 crore. In August-2025, Tk 4084.5 crore more revenue was collected compared to the previous August-2024 month, the growth rate achieved was 18%.
The revenue from the Custom Wing witnessed a negative growth, showing the sluggish export import activities of the country.
The target for this section was Tk 10,061.35 crore while the collection was Tk 7647 crore. The collection in the same month last year was 8007.49 crore. That means it suffered a 4.50 percent downtrend compared to the previous month.
The collection from Value Added Tax (VAT) was Tk 11,085 against the target of Tk 10,660.20 crore. The collection of the same month in the previous fiscal was Tk 8,282.15 core, which means a 33.83 percent jump of collection in the second month of the fiscal.
For the income tax wing, the collection was Tk 8442 crore against the target of Tk 10,167.75 crore while it was Tk 6798.73 crore for August 2024 means a 24.17 percent increase.
The total revenue collection in these two months of July-August of 2025 was Tk 54,423.00 crore while total revenue collection in the same period of 2024 was Tk 45,005.16 crore. The revenue collection in these two months of July-August of this year has grown by 21%.
