Salman F Rahman, MP and the Private Industry and Investment Adviser to the Prime Minister gave a positive indication that the tax holiday facility in the ICT sector of the country will remain in force this year as well.
He said, ‘I had an opportunity to talk to the Prime Minister about the issue of tax exemption. The Prime Minister assured to consider the proposal in view of the request to impose taxes consistently and rationally in different periods. This time the budget will inform how long the tax exemption can be.
Salman was addressing a ceremony organised by the Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS) for taking over the charge of office of it's newly elected EC members on Monday at the Hotel Radisson Blu in the capital.
The newly elected Executive Council expressed commitment to achieve self-sufficiency and establish sovereignty of indigenous software in the ICT sector to implement Smart Bangladesh.
The State Minister for Posts, Telecommunication and Information Technology Zunaid Ahmed Palak, MP, State Minister for Commerce Ahasanul Islam (Titu), MP, were present as special guests while FBCCI President Mahbubul Alam were present as guest of Honor.
Apart from this, former president of BASIS, Sarwar Alam, Rafiqul Islam Rowly, outgoing executive council members, former executive committee members, and representatives of BASIS member companies and officials of various embassies in Bangladesh were present.
At the ceremony, Russell T. Ahmed, President of BASIS, M Rashidul Hasan, Senior Vice President of BASIS, Syed Mohammad Kamal, Vice President (Admin) and Iqbal Ahmed Fakhrul Hasan, Vice President (Finance), and the newly elected Directors of BASIS Md. Mostafizur Rahaman Sohel, Didarul Alam, M Asif Rahman, Dr. Muhammad Risalat Siddique, Mir Shahrukh Islam, Biplob Ghosh Rahul and Syed Abdullah Jayed took oath. As Russell T. Ahmed re-elected as the President of BASIS, outgoing Vice-President (Admin) Abu Daud Khan and Vice President (Finance) Fahim Ahmed handed over the BASIS flag to him at the ceremony. Samira Zuberi Himika, the outgoing Senior Vice-President of BASIS, delivered the welcome address on the occasion.
BASIS President Russell T. Ahmed said, ‘We have noticed a number of inconsistencies in the NBR regarding tax exemptions in the IT sector.
According to them, the IT sector makes a profit of tk5 thousand crore and the revenue of this industry is tk50 thousand crore. But the total turnover of this sector is tk2 thousand crores. Once this anomaly is removed, we think the IMF will lose interest in taxing this industry.
In this case, we are demanding tax exemption till 2031 considering the potential of this sector.
FBCCI President Mahbubul Alam said that ICT sector is one of the most important drivers of Bangladesh's economy.
The role of this sector is immense in the implementation of Smart Bangladesh. It is hoped that the newly elected Executive Council of BASIS will play an important role in developing the indigenous software industry, achieving self-sufficiency.
