Major Trade Unions in the country announced earlier to observe a nationwide complete shutter down strike to protest against the anti-business measures taken by the government through the Finance Bill 2019 – 2020.
Before the strike, Prime Minister Imran Khan had visited Karachi to meet the business community to discuss their genuine concerns, but unfortunately, the dialogues could not fetch the desired results.
Soon after the meeting, trade unions from Karachi and all around the country announced to protest against the government policies by way of the strike. Apparently, a lack of coordination or communications was observed between the unions as the strike couldn’t be enforced completely. Markets were partially closed and activities in some of the areas were still going on. Similar kind of situation was observes nationwide and in Karachi as well. Traders claimed that the increased GST should be decreased otherwise, it would be difficult for the business to survive.
The other major reason that worked as a catalyst was the condition of CNIC in order to bring the trade under proper documentation. The critics are of the opinion that the real reason behind the strike was to put undue pressure on the government to withdraw this condition so that the businesses remain undocumented. Majority of the business in the wholesale markets of Karachi are undocumented to gains undue profits and avoid tax payments.
As believed widely, that Pakistanis are the biggest charity payers in the world, leads to an ugly truth of the other side is that the same philanthropist community is least paying community in the country in general. People, in general, do not pay tax and prefer to spend the funds in the name of charity.
By implementing the latest policies, FBR and government plan to document the economy to increase the tax collections for improvements of the economic deficits of the country. By exercising the mandatory requirement of procuring CNICs from customers conducting transactions of 50,000 rupees or above, the government would be able to track the volume of business of individuals for the sake of tax purpose, which is much resented by the unions.
