Bhopal: The Bhopal Municipal Corporation (BMC) is yet to get its Rs 400 crore of tax. The steps taken by the BMC for enhancing the tax recovery to increase its wealth are not sufficient. The measures such as property measurement using GIS technique, providing bulk connections, national lok adalat have proved inefficient.
In 2018, cheques of around Rs 2 crore received by the BMC under property and water tax have bounced. Refusal to pay taxes by government buildings, restriction on auction of several properties, stay order on the tax recovery to the tune of crores, faulty measurement of properties are some of the issues affecting the tax collection.
Out of Rs 400 crore, around Rs 300 crore are pending on the government buildings. Over Rs 30 crore tax is pending on Indian railways but it has paid only few lakhs. Malls are also paying less than the due tax. Tax of over Rs 27 crore is due on Army cantonment.
The army and Mandi board buildings are also reluctant to pay the tax to the BMC for various reasons. BMC had recently introduced the GIS mapping of houses and other properties for the recovery of tax and to get a data of the properties in digital format.
However, it was then surrounded in controversies as the private party which was asked to conduct the survey work could not establish a rapport with BMC staff. The GIS mapping work is underway but is not likely to serve the purpose- the way hype was created around it at the time of launch.
Zone chairperson Sanjeev Gupta says that the property tax should be recovered under different slabs but it is not happening in the BMC. He held tax for shops and houses are collected under the similar rate which affects the tax payers. BMC additional commissioner Ranveer Singh when contacted said urban bodies rely heavily on taxes. He says that the areas where we are lacking will soon be targeted for which we have written to the state finance commission. The tax defaulters will be dealt with in accordance to law, he added.
