Telangana: Know & pay Property Tax on Whatsapp in ULBs

Hyderabad: Now view and pay your property tax on Whatsapp. Thanks to the provisions in the ease of doing business, all the municipalities and municipal corporations in Telangana State would provide the opportunity for the citizens to view the details of their property tax and can also have the option of paying it online.

The State Government has been implementing the reforms under the Ease of Doing Business (EoDB) and as part of this the urban local bodies in the State would have to strictly follow the provisions of the Act and reforms under EoDB.

According to the officials in the Directorate of Municipal Administration, the municipalities have been asked to adopt an e-governance system for citizen services on any time and anywhere basis for better, speedy, transparent and accountable administration.

Similarly, they have been asked to deliver the municipal services online for the convenience of citizens in a time-bound manner as per the citizen's charter prescribed under the Schedule-III of the Telangana Municipalities Act. If the timeline is not followed, a penalty has been prescribed. "Every municipality should establish one or more citizen service centres for the purpose of providing online services, and also for facilitating redressal of citizen grievances," said a senior official.

The DMA has brought up a Whatsapp number 9000253342 for providing tax details and option for payment duly linking with the Centre for Good Governance (CGG) portal. This service is named as 'Telangana e-Pattana Sevalu' to ease tax payers to obtain the details of their property tax by way of pinning their assessment number or door number to the Whatsapp number, which would provide the tax details of the said property and also give option of payment online through credit/debit card or net banking etc duly linking to CGG portal, said the official. There will be a QR code attached to the number and would be displayed at the offices, the official added.

Under the EODB, four state reforms were proposed including obtaining water connection, trade license, signage license for advertisement and mobile tower approval. Similarly, the district reforms include road cutting permission, inspection carried out for granting road cutting permission and verification to ensure proper restoration, property tax/ vacant land tax, obtaining connection, trade license and renewal, certificate of non availability of water from water supply agency required for NOC for water, obtaining sewer connection and registration of contractors for works and services.

Director of Municipal Administration N Satyanarayana has asked all the municipal commissioners except GHMC to popularise the Whatsapp number and also display the template of the Whatsapp number and QR code so that the taxpayers can check the details of their property tax, the official said.