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Taxation


VMC abolishes manual collection of house tax

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The Times of India      17.09.2014 

VMC abolishes manual collection of house tax

 

Varanasi: Taking a step towards paperless office, Varanasi Municipal Corporation had taken an initiative to bring its property and taxation department online.

"We have abolished 100% manually collection of house tax. The inspectors equipped with spot billing machine (SBM) go to the houses to collect tax. Around 20% of people are paying house tax bills online," Sandeep Srivastava of computer coordinator cell of VMC. The SBM service has been started from September 2 and till September15, as many as 1,119 people paid their house tax through this service, he said. VMC was first in Uttar Pradesh to begin online portal for paying tax in 2009.

In the current financial year from April to September 15, as many as 330 people had deposited house tax worth Rs 3.78 lakh online. The department has established computerised centres for paying tax in Bhelupura, Dashashwmedh, Kotwali, Adampura and trans-Varuna zones with the headquarters at VMC. People are free to pay bills anywhere at these six places.

A tax payer said: "The computerised system is bringing transparency in the system, which gives a feeling of satisfaction." E-services has brought more transparency in the department as till 2009, VMC used to collect only Rs 7 crores to Rs 8 crores as tax but using e-services, the amount reached above Rs 22 crores annually.

VMC is also gearing up to provide death and birth certificates of individuals on the spot in hospitals. The process is in its last stage as the software of incurring digital signature of people into the computer system has been stocked at NIC in Lucknow. For experiment, ten hospitals including government and private nursing homes, are to be connected with main computer system that would be located in VMC. 

 

Govt to amend rules, allow property tax refund claims

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The Times of India      12.09.2014 

Govt to amend rules, allow property tax refund claims

 

GURGAON: The state government has decided to amend its property tax policy, which is good news for taxpayers who have paid in excess if one takes into account recent policy changes.

Officials said that since house tax policy has changed several times over the last few years, and with the latest change adopted in October 2013, the quantum of tax actually reduced, meaning tax payers had paid in excess.

"The house tax policy of the state has been changed a couple of times in the recent past and before the latest policy was announced in October 2013, some consumers were paying in excess. However, when the new policy was announced, some tax was reduced or rationalized and therefore some of the taxpayers have benefited," said P Raghavendra Rao, additional chief secretary to the government of Haryana.

"Some of them have been demanding that the excess amount that they have paid be refunded and since there was no such provision, we had to bring this amendment. According to this amendment, which has already come into effect, those owners who have paid more can now approach the municipal corporation and seek a refund. In case they do not wish to seek a refund the excess amount will automatically get adjusted against property tax for the year 2014-15," he said.

Rao, the principal secretary of the urban local bodies department, said while there might not be many in the residential category who would have been charged excess amount, there are many who might want to seek a refund in the institutional and commercial category.

"The tax amount in the residential sector is not much, but those in the commercial category would benefit as they pay lakhs of rupees as tax and they might want to seek a refund. The excess amount will be refunded to them without interest by the municipal corporation concerned," he said.

 

Civic body to bring new properties under tax net

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The Times of India        12.09.2014

Civic body to bring new properties under tax net

 

AURANGABAD: The Aurangabad Municipal Corporation is once again gearing up to launch a drive to identify new properties and step up tax recovery. The civic body, facing financial difficulties, has planned to deploy more manpower for the purpose.

Sources in the civic body said that the increased financial liabilities of the AMC had left no other option for it but to consolidate its revenue generation.

Ramesh Pawar, additional municipal commissioner, also said that the civic is looking forward to generate more revenue. "We have found that many properties in the city are remaining out of the tax net. Looking at the city's population and geographic area, the number of properties registered with the municipal body is quite less. It seems that there is enough scope for identifying new properties and brining then under tax net," he said.

The city has an estimated population of 12.5 lakh, while it covers nearly 152 square km area.

Pawar said that 1.91 lakh properties (commercial and residential) have been registered with the municipal body. "But it should be more than this. Municipal commissioner Prakash Mahajan has directed the authorities to make efforts to increase revenue. He has also agreed to provide additional manpower to the civic tax assessment department," he said.

Currently, the department has eight sub-overseers to take care of the entire city. Besides property assessment, these sub-overseers are also conducting surveys and resolving disputes. This ultimately affects the assessment process.

The AMC on Thursday claimed that it has identified nearly 10,000 new properties in the past two financial years and brought them under the ambit of property tax. In the current year, it has completed assessment of 2,221 new properties. The civic body is expecting additional revenue of Rs 5 to Rs 6 crore from new properties in the current financial year.

In 2012-13, the civic body had aimed to collect property tax of Rs 100 crore but the actual collection was only Rs 58.11 crore. In 2013-14, the AMC had collected about Rs 70 crore against the target of Rs 100 crore. In the current financial year, the AMC has set a target of Rs 130-140 crore, while the recovery till date stands at Rs 27 crore.

Increased financial liabilities

The Aurangabad Municipal Corporation has recently handed over two projects - water distribution and streetlights - to two private players. This has resulted in additional financial liabilities on the civic body. For the street light project, the AMC has to pay Rs 2.71 crore per month for a period of 10 years, while, for the water distribution projects, it has to shell out Rs 5.25 crore per month.

Apart from this, the civic body has to take care of its monthly expenditure, including Rs 11.87 crore on salaries and Rs 3.3 crore on repayment of loans and other routine expenses. In all, the AMC's monthly liability is Rs 25 to 28 crore but its revenue generation is less than Rs 25 crore (average based of last three months' collection).

 

MCC to soon introduce online payment of property tax

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The Hindu   01.09.2014 

MCC to soon introduce online payment of property tax

Online payment of property tax in the city will soon be a reality, consequent to upgrading of software.

The proposal was originally mooted in 2010. However, the concept failed to take off due to technical and administrative issues as the Municipal Reforms Cell had insisted on fine tuning the software on one hand and digitising the property database of MCC on the other, before it could be launched.

M.B.L. Bhyrappa, chairman, Standing Committee on Finance, Taxation and Appeals Committee, told The Hindu that payment of property tax online could be a reality as early as “within a month” as some of the technical glitches had been sorted out.

Fine-tuning of software

“The software had to be fine-tuned to indicate a 15 per cent upward revision in property tax once in three years under the self-assessment scheme (SAS) as stipulated by law and this aspect has been incorporated in the new software. Hence, we expect the online payment facility to become a reality within a month,” said Mr. Bhyrappa.

Bank

At present, only ICICI bank account holders with net banking facility can make property tax payment.

Impact

When launched, the efficiency in tax collection is expected to increase as many registered property owners tend to postpone payment of tax as they loathe standing in lengthy queues.

But the launch of online payment mechanism will obviate the need for the public to stand in queue and finish the payment at the click of a button.

Setback

Meanwhile, the MCC plan to augment its revenue by bringing the mobile towers under tax-net, has received a setback. Mr. Bhyrappa said there was a High Court judgement against it, following which, the MCC was forced to revoke its earlier order making it mandatory to collect Rs.12,000 a tower as property tax.

Resource-base

The MCC had viewed the mobile towers as a “resource base which could be tapped to enhance its revenue collections. The MCC had argued that owners of vacant sites and those permitting installation of mobile towers on rooftops were doing so by charging exorbitant rent from the mobile service providers and hence it was a commercial transaction.

But, they were not paying any tax to the MCC. Mr. Bhyrappa said the court order had restrained them from implementing it.

Advertisement rates

In the meantime, the MCC has revised the advertisement rates to shore up its revenue.

The hike in tariffs is almost double but the rates vary from area to area depending on their commercial importance. In Zone A, the advertisement rate is Rs.70 a sq. ft. of hoarding, up from the earlier rate of Rs. 35 a sq. ft.

Target

The MCC aims at collecting Rs. 90 crore by way of property tax this fiscal against which, it had collected Rs. 45 crore so far. Besides, Rs. 20 crore arrears due from last year was pending collection.


Originally mooted in 2010, the proposal could not be introduced owing to technical reasons

Implementation of new system expected to augment property tax collection

 

Graduates apply for MCD jobs that pay Rs.7,000 per month

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The Hindu      06.08.2014  

Graduates apply for MCD jobs that pay Rs.7,000 per month

Waiting to hear back from a prospective employer can be a stressful experience for anyone. But, those who are clearly over-qualified for the job should be able to relax. Not Nita (name changed). The 27-year-old holds an M.A. in Hindi and has applied for a school attendant’s post in a municipal corporation. The job entails taking care of students and helping out teachers, and pays minimum wage, which is Rs.7,722 per month for un-skilled workers.

“I want to be a teacher, but getting a government job isn’t easy. I don’t have any other option this time because this would be my first job,” she said.

She had applied for the post, which requires Class X qualification, with the North Delhi Municipal Corporation. Thousands of applications for 270 posts of school attendants and 95 posts of nursery ayahs were handed in from May 29 to June 4.

“This is the first time in over a decade that we have advertised such vacancies, so the number of applicants is high. Till now, we have been able to process 15,000 applications and it will take another month to know the exact number,” said North Corporation Education Director Jasram Kaim.

He explained that there were many others like Nita who were over-qualified for the jobs. “We have got graduates who have applied for the nursery ayah’s post,” he added. But, he said, the applicants with higher qualifications will not be given any extra credit for the same.

Senior municipal officials said they could only set minimum qualification criteria and not the maximum. South Delhi Municipal Corporation spokesperson Mukesh Yadav said: “Usually, when we conduct recruitment for group D jobs, most of the applicants are over-qualified.”

Stories repeat themselves

Inadequate employment for the thousands of new graduates joining the Capital’s workforce every year, plus the perceived security of government jobs, means that the next time there are vacancies in the municipal corporations, Nita’s story will repeat itself.

I want to be a teacher, but getting a government job isn’t easy. I don’t have any other option this time because this would be my first job

 


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