Mumbai: The BMC has collected ₹5,368 crore as property tax for 2022-23 (till 7pm March 31). However this year’s collection has not been able to surpass last year’s recovery as the Supreme Court had upheld the Bombay High Court’s order of fixing capital values. In the last financial year, the BMC had recovered ₹5,792 crore as property tax.
The BMC had to revise the target of property tax collection from ₹7,000 crore to ₹4,800 crore owing to exemption for residential properties up to 500 sqft. This resulted in a loss of ₹462 crore. Moreover, the revision in tax that was due in 2020-21 was deferred due to the Covid-19 pandemic and continued till 2023, which decreased revenue by ₹1,080 crore. The officials of the assessor and collection department were given individual targets to trace big defaulters and convince them to pay their dues.
Officers sent door-to-door to convince defaulters
A civic official said, “We have started sending bills directly to flat owners from this year. So many of them paid directly to the BMC, instead of handing it to the society. Our officials were tasked to go door-to-door and convince the defaulters. This had an impact on the defaulters and we could cover the revised target by March 28,” said a civic official. Joint municipal commissioner Sunil Dhamne said, “Several people cleared the dues on the last day, so the actual revenue generated through property tax will be reflected by midnight.”