Yesterday (March 18), National Board of Revenue (NBR) chairman Md Abdur Rahman Khan said Bangladesh was considering the introduction of a QR code system band-roll for the tobacco sector to prevent tax evasion. Speaking at a pre-budget meeting with the Anti-Tobacco Media Alliance (ATMA), he said that high taxes on tobacco products have created a huge amount of illicit cigarettes entering the country, thus depriving the NBR of due revenue.
The chairman said some bidi companies use counterfeit band-rolls to avoid paying taxes in the national exchequer.
“Even they bring those band-rolls from abroad after printing in there,” he said. The NBR chairman put emphasis on establishing a cashless society to stop tax evasion.
The ATMA argued cigarette prices in the country were too low, and that having a four-tier price system (low, medium, high, and premium) has rendered the tobacco price and tax measures less effective. It proposed merging the low and medium categories.