Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) has filed a report with the High Court saying that mobile operators Grameenphone, Banglalink and Robi have given Tk 8,744.19 crore to Google and Facebook for the last five years.

The report was filed in the High Court (HC) bench comprising Justice Moinul Islam Chowdhury and Justice Md Ashraful Kamal.

Lawyer AKM Alamgir Parvez filed the report on behalf of BTRC. Lawyer Mohammad Humayun Kabir Pallab was present for the writ. Deputy Attorney General Tushar Kanti Roy was present for the state.

During the hearing, the report signed by Engineer Md Nahidul Hasan, Deputy Director of BTRC’s Systems and Services Department, was submitted. However, the National Board of Revenue submitted another report on the same issue.

As not satisfying with the report, the High Court has directed the NBR to submit the report again by October 19.

At the same time, the court has directed the NBR to inform the court what steps have been taken to collect revenue from all Internet-based companies.

Earlier on April 18, 2018, the High Court ordered an investigation into tax evasion of all Internet-based companies, including Facebook and the search engine Google.

The committee formed by finance ministry secretary, governor of Bangladesh Bank, chairman of NBR, secretary of the law ministry, secretary of information and technology ministry, chairman of BTRC and postal and telecommunications ministry — was directed to investigate into the matter.

It is also asked to collect revenue from the amount paid against any transaction including advertising, domain sale and sale of various licenses through the Internet.

In the meantime, the HC issued a rule asking why it should not be directed to collect the required revenue from Internet-based companies. the defendants were asked to respond to this rule within four weeks.

Earlier on April 9, 2018, the search engine Google and social media Facebook filed a writ petition against the tax evasion of all Internet-based companies.

DailyBangladesh/Adnan