THIS is with reference to the report `Senators call on PM Shehbaz to undo FBR `extravagance`` (Jan 23). There has been much criticism of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) for planning to buy 1,010 cars costing Rs6 billion. But, I, for one, fail to understand why there is so much brouhaha over such a simple matter.

Truly, it is well-known that the FBR employs honest, hard-working officers who also belong to poor or lower middle-class families. This is why, in my opinion, they should be given many more facilities in addition to 1,300cc cars. For instance, houses.

As everyone knows, tax-evaders respect only those officers who own expensive houses. Give each one of the field officers a bungalow costing at least a hundred million, and see how efficient they would become.

Now I know that the spoilsports will say the usual stuff about 40 per cent of people going hungry to bed at night, that millions of children are stunted (those that do not die before the age of five, that is), but so what? Are those poor FBR officers responsible for so many people being poor? And why do the bunch of critics not look at the 60pc who do have enough to eat, and the millions of children who are not yet stunted? As for those who say that the founder of the country refused to go abroad for treatment, or that he did not have even one police van escorting him (instead of 50 for each of our rulers today), because the country was poor, well, folks, those times were different. We are living in different times.

Finally, I wish to suggest that all the 1,010 officers should be given all-expense paid trips every six months to the holy land. They will surely need to pray hard to succeed in making the FBR achieve its revenue target without any hassle.

Shakir Lakhani Karachi