Illegal Tobacco Business, Alarming News

The extraordinary increase in illicit tobacco business in the country has rung alarm bells in higher echelons of authority. An urgent need to check its rampant growth has been acknowledged by the tax authorities. According to sources there has been an increase of 11 percent in illegal cigarette trade during last one year, bringing losses worth billions of rupees to the national exchequer. The sudden surge in the sale of tax-evaded cigarette products is causing annual loss of Rs 10 billion in spite of the fact a regulatory framework is already in place to curb such illicit trade. The alarming figures made available to this correspondent project a doomsday scenario for country’s legal cigarette industry. However the heat is perhaps felt in corridors of power as well as a few months back, Cabinet Secretary Nargis Sethi wrote a letter to Chairman Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) asking him to take stringent measures to check the rising tide of illicit tobacco trade. The letter also referred to Pakistan’s commitment under Article- 15 of Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), the first global public health treaty, according to which Pakistan has to take effective legislative, executive, administrative or other measures to eliminate the illicit trade in tobacco products. However, the letter fell short of suggesting specific measures like ban on sale of filter rods to unregistered manufacturers and constitution of special implementation teams.