The Hindu 24.03.2010
MCD plans new steps to collect more property tax
Manisha Jha
Civic body confident of meeting target of Rs. 1,200 crore by March 31
Present level of tax compliance is about 25 to 30 per cent
NEW DELHI: Buoyed by its impressive property tax collection of Rs.972 crore including transfer duty totalling Rs.365 crore till March 16 this year compared with last year's total of Rs.912 crore, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi is confident that it will be able to meet its target of Rs.1,200 crore by March 31 for the first time in the past four years since it introduced its new Unit Area Method for property tax evaluation.
To increase its property tax collections further given that a whopping 70 per cent of the people still remain outside its house tax net, the civic body has planned a slew of new measures. They include a survey of farmhouses and industrial areas, targeting unauthorised colonies, unauthorised regularised colonies and village properties being put to commercial use and roping in its domestic breeding checkers (DBC) staff to conduct a door-to-door survey for reining in potential tax payers and detecting defaulters.
According to MCD records, it has so far successfully managed to bring in a higher number of taxpayers (9.16 lakh) this year, of whom 40 per cent paid their taxes online compared with last year's figure of 7.94 lakh taxpayers only. MCD tax department officials said the positive trend is a fall-out of several reasons including the success of its amnesty scheme launched this year with full waiver of penalty and interest on tax arrears.
A senior MCD official said: “Apart from a certain natural growth expected in the number of taxpayers, our amnesty scheme also received a good response and made it more attractive for taxpayers to approach us to settle their pending arrears compared with last year's amnesty scheme giving only a 75 per cent interest waiver, this year we gave full waiver. In addition, due to the survey conducted by Survey of India to take into account potential property tax payers and detect defaulters, several new taxpayers in new areas and districts received notifications and became part of the system, increasing our taxpayer base.”
“But there is still a long way to go as our present level of tax compliance is still about 25 to 30 per cent as 70 per cent people are still not paying their house tax. By a slew of new measures we plan to cross the barrier of 10 lakh taxpayers by March-end even though there are 40 to 50 lakh taxpayers in Delhi as per the Survey of India that are still not paying us any house tax,” he added. To further increase the number of taxpayers, the civic body is also planning to double its DBC staff meant to check dengue outbreak in the city as survey conductors for getting information on potential property tax payers.
The MCD official said: “We had first approached banks and private discoms to outsource the data collection work given our own manpower crunch with just 45 per cent of sanctioned staff strength available. However, now following the Municipal Commissioner's in-principle approval we have asked for approval to rope in 3,500 of our DBC for carrying out a door-to-door property tax related survey in the six month time period when they are not occupied with breeding checks. We plan to start this drive from April and hope that it would lead to better impact on our property tax collections.”
The last date for payment of property tax is March 31 and the civic body says it has fully geared up its online system of accepting taxes to avoid the sort of server crash that occurred last year.
