Nearly five lakh people not paying Property Taxes: GHMC

Hyderabad, April 9 (INN): GHMC Commissioner MT Krishna Babu has informed that 4 to 5 lakh people in GHMC limits are not habituated to pay property tax.

The Commissioner held a review meeting with Special Commissioner Naveen Mittal and all the Zonal Commissioners, Additional Commissioners, Deputy Commissioners in Panwar Hall on Tuesday.

The Commissioner directed all the officials that the focus of GHMC for next three months should be on collecting property tax from the people who are not habituated to pay the property tax.

He has directed the officials to list out the property owners who are not paying property tax since last four years and directed the Zonal Commissioners to hold circle wise meeting with the bill collectors by duly giving them the list of non tax payers and by duly fixing them the weekly targets. He further directed the officials to be most strict on the commercial and higher middle class of the above list.

The Commissioner has asked the Zonal Commissioners and Deputy Commissioners that settling of property tax revision petitions should be their second priority in coming days and further directed the officials to hold counseling for revision petitions from 15th April to 2nd week of May 2013.

He further directed the officers concerned to update the top 1000 defaulters of property tax data base and upload the revised data to GHMC website in 10 days. He also directed to update the discrepancies in website which they have come across during their verification.

The third priority should be given to GIS mapping for setting up dockets and door to door survey of Bill Collectors should simultaneously bring the un-assessed and under assessed properties under tax net, the Commissioner said. The Commissioner further directed the Zonal Commissioners to provide two assistants to the Bill Collector to take up door to door survey.

The Commissioner congratulated the Town Planning wing for getting more revenue from BPS and LRS schemes when compare to that of last year and directed the Additional Commissioner (Planning) to take up a massive ad campaign to curb unauthorized constructions and to protect the hardened money to the innocent people.

The Commissioner also reviewed about trade licenses and directed the Additional Commissioner (H&S) to fix up the responsibilities to the Assistant License Officers (ALOs) and Sanitary Supervisors to take up a massive survey to bring the trades under the net.

The Commissioner said that he will be holding regular review meetings with the Zonal Commissioners every week and monthly with Deputy Commissioners with regard to revenue collections to review the progress of the revenue collections.