In November 2021, the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) announced it seized contraband cigarettes worth Rs21.5 million.
In November, the FBR’s Revenue’s Inland Revenue Enforcement Network (IREN) teams recovered 8,320,000 contraband cigarettes, totaling Rs17.2 million in duty and tax evasion.
According to a report published last year by Oxford Economics, tax evasion from illicit cigarettes was Rs50.9 billion in 2018-19 and will rise to Rs77.3 billion in 2019-20. According to the tobacco business, illegal cigarettes have a market share of up to 40% in the country.
