The government walked into Monday’s budget hearing with a sealed envelope, refusing to open it. Finance Secretary Imdadullah Bosal stood firm: the International Monetary Fund discussions meant he couldn’t tell lawmakers how much tax relief was actually costing the country. MNA Jawed Hanif Khan asked the straightforward question everyone wanted answered. Bosal’s reply? Not yet.
This is the parliament that’s supposed to approve the new budget. These are the elected representatives who answer to you and me. Yet they’re being kept waiting for basic numbers about how Rs360 billion—roughly the amount every Pakistani pays in income tax annually—got distributed as relief before they could even vote on it.
What actually happened? The government gave away Rs360 billion in tax breaks without fully disclosing the breakdown to the National Assembly standing finance committee that approves budgets. The IMF wouldn’t let them say it aloud in a public hearing. So Bosal privately whispered the numbers to committee chairman Naveed Qamar, who then essentially confirmed them by saying Khan was “very close” when he guessed Rs360 billion.
Hina Rabbani Khar, a standing committee member, called this unprofessional. She’s being diplomatic. What else do you call it when your government treats the people’s representatives like children who can’t handle the truth?
Where Rs360 Billion Actually Went
Breaking it down is where things get interesting. Property buyers got Rs115 billion off their withholding taxes. Salaried workers—teachers, nurses, engineers making modest incomes—received Rs52 billion combined. The property sector alone grabbed more than twice what salaried individuals got.
Airlines cut their excise duty costs by Rs24 billion. Foreign transactions lost Rs17 billion in withholding taxes on card payments. Capital value tax on international deals? Abolished entirely, costing Rs7 billion, because Pakistani expats were dodging it by technically becoming non-residents.
Bilal Kayani, the Minister of State for Finance, explained one bit: business class passengers were gaming the system by booking cheap economy tickets then upgrading mid-flight. Fair point. But the committee wanted to know something else entirely.
The Missing Revenue Question Nobody’s Answering
Here’s what keeps me up: when you hand out Rs360 billion in tax breaks, where does that money come from? Naveed Qamar asked exactly this. He wanted proof that the government had actually planned how to fill the hole. The government claimed it would offset losses with “equal amounts of additional revenue and enforcement measures,” but no one’s seen the math.
He also pushed back on whether the salaried class relief actually helps middle-income earners struggling with inflation. Kayani said maximum possible relief went their way. Maybe. But when property dealers get 2.2 times more help than salaried workers, something feels off-balance.
Qamar ordered the Finance Ministry and the Federal Board of Revenue to submit detailed breakdowns before the Finance Bill comes back for another hearing. Revenue estimates. Fiscal impact. Implementation plans. All the stuff that should’ve been there from day one. The question isn’t whether they’ll deliver—it’s whether the IMF will let them talk about what they find.
