Hyderabad: GHMC flexes its muscles, cracks whip on property tax defaulters

Hyderabad: With an eye on filling its coffers, the fund-starved Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) is leaving no stone unturned during property tax collection and has even started shutting down the businesses that were found defaulting on property tax payments.

In order to increase the revenue collection, the civic body has set certain targets for tax inspectors, bill collectors and valuation officers to collect the tax in their respective circles and zones. The Corporation has collected around Rs 5 crore property tax in the last two days and the process has picked up pace.

Further, GHMC Commissioner DS Lokesh Kumar is holding regular meetings with Zonal Commissioners and Deputy Commissioners and monitoring the collection of tax besides setting targets for the officials.

Meanwhile, the officials are seizing the business establishments if the property tax was found pending for more than two years and also serving notices to tax defaulters besides giving them a deadline to pay the tax. The officials have recently seized a few business establishments at the LB Nagar Zone and other parts of the city.

The officials are hoping to receive large amounts of property tax in the second phase from October to March. While the civic body has set a target to collect Rs 1,800 crore property tax this fiscal, so far it could only collect Rs 868 crore, which is Rs 225 crore less than the previous financial year during the same period.

According to officials, the bill collectors will collect 50 per cent of the property tax and the remaining 50 per cent can be paid through online, Meeseva centres etc.