ISLAMABAD: The Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) is set to take up super tax cases related to Sections 4B and 4C of the Income Tax Ordinance, 2001, from January 5. A three-judge bench of the FCC, headed by Justice Amin-ud-Din Khan and comprising Justice Syed Hasan Azhar Rizvi and Justice Arshad Hussain, on December 1, 2025, heard the Federal Board of Revenue’s (FBR) appeals against the judgments of the Sindh, Lahore, and Islamabad High Courts regarding the levy of Super Tax. However, when the proceedings commenced, assistant counsel Saad Hashmi informed the bench that Makhdoom Ali Khan was occupied with several cases in the Supreme Court and requested that the case be conducted via video link. Justice Amin then said video-link facilities were currently unavailable; therefore, the request could not be granted. Subsequently, the court adjourned further hearing of the case until January 5. A five-judge Constitutional Bench of the Supreme Court, headed by Justice Amin-ud-Din Khan, on October 24, 2025, had adjourned the hearing. After the enactment of the 27th Amendment, when the FCC was established, the Super Tax appeals were transferred to the FCC along with other petitions filed under erstwhile Article 184(3) of the Constitution. Section 4B was inserted in the Income Tax Ordinance, 2001 through the Finance Act, 2015 during the PML-N government had introduced Super Tax on rich individuals, association of persons and companies earning income above Rs500 million in tax year 2015 at rate of 4 percent of income of banking companies and 3 percent on other categories for rehabilitation of temporarily displaced persons through Finance Bill (2015-16). The government inserted Section 4C in the Income Tax Ordinance through the Finance Act 2022 to charge the super tax from 13 specific sectors that, according to it, made windfall gains, taking their total income tax rate to 39%. The government had imposed the super tax on banks, cement, iron and steel, sugar, oil and gas, fertilisers, LNG terminals, textile, automobile, cigarettes, beverages, chemicals, and airlines. The super tax under Section 4C was imposed on profits of wealthy corporations whose earnings exceeded Rs150 million, to ease the impact of the rising inflation on the poor. The FBR had projected to generate Rs250 billion through the imposition of the super tax in FY23. Several companies then approached all the provincial High Courts and the Islamabad High Court, challenging the levy of the super tax. Copyright Business Recorder, 2026