SIM tax along with the cost of mobile calls and internet will be increased

Finance Minister Abul Hasan Mahmud Ali has proposed to increase the supplementary duty on mobile phone calls and internet services by 5 percent to 20 percent. At the same time, SIM tax has been proposed to increase by 100 percent to Tk 300 in the new financial year.

He made this proposal in his budget speech for the fiscal year 2024-25 in the National Parliament on Thursday in the afternoon. In this proposal, from the upper class to the middle class, the cost of talking on mobile phones will increase by using Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp to meet the various needs of life.

The mobile phone operators will implement the new tariffs immediately after the proposed budget is announced. An official of the public relation department of a mobile operator company said without revealing his name, 'The order (SRO) is sent only when the finance minister starts addressing the national parliament to announce the budget. As a result, tax deduction may be started from the customer at the new rate from 3 pm on Thursday (June 6).

As a result of the increase in supplementary duty, the government will get 28-taka duty-tax on recharging 100 taka and the mobile customer will get talk time equivalent to the remaining amount. Because, earlier, customers had to pay 15 percent VAT and 15 percent supplementary duty on mobile phone call rates. Now it has been increased by 5 percent. Along with this, consumers have to pay 1 percent surcharge. That is, due to the new supplementary duty increase of 5 percent, a customer can now talk about 69 taka 35 paisa after deducting VAT and supplementary duty, if he recharges by 100 taka.

On the other hand, in the budget proposal, this time, the amount of tax against the supply of each SIM card or e-SIM is proposed to be increased to Tk 300 instead of Tk 200, so the cost will increase in this case as well.

In the financial year 2011-12, this SIM tax journey was first started in the country; then it was announced as Tk. 800. Then it was reduced by 200 taka to 600 taka. Later this tax reduced by half to Tk. 300. However, SIM tax has been reduced to Tk. 100 from the financial year 2015-16. Later in the financial year 2019-20 the SIM tax was doubled again to Tk. 200.

In an immediate reaction to the budget, the President of the Mobile Phone Consumers Association, Mohiuddin Ahmed, said that the proposed budget will deprive 40 percent of citizens from telecommunication services. The plan to bring 100 percent of the population under telecommunications Internet service by 2041 will keep out-of-service citizens from connecting there due to sim tax and service tax hikes.