Buildings In Coimbatore To Be Re-assessed

More than two-lakh buildings in the city – residential, industrial and commercial – will undergo fresh assessment for Property Tax. A decision to carry out 100 per cent verification and re-assessment was taken at an all-party meeting at the Corporation on Friday. An official said the exercise might begin on June 25. Following a Government order to all urban local bodies, the Corporation recently increased Property Tax rates for all categories of buildings after a decade.

A resolution on the increase was placed in the Coimbatore Corporation Council in April for its approval. But, it was deferred in the face of opposition from various parties in the Corporation Council. The resolution was placed again in the Council the next month and the tax increase was approved after the originally proposed rates were scaled down. In the meantime, the Corporation embarked upon identifying buildings that were not assessed for tax. Entire buildings and additional structures were covered in this exercise. A Corporation revenue wing official said 22,000 buildings that were not assessed were covered in the drive.

But, there were complaints of many additional structures having been left out. For instance, an additional portion or an entire floor constructed in 1999 would not look like a new construction now. Many such structures had not been assessed after the construction and they did not draw the attention of the Corporation teams in the ongoing exercise. Therefore, the all-party meeting concluded that huge revenue due to the Corporation could be tapped only if a fresh assessment was done across the city. The official said that the Corporation was also providing forms to the public for self-assessment of tax. They could fill in the details of their buildings and submit the forms to the Corporation. The civic body would, however, carry out an on-the-spot verification. The meeting also decided that 36 committees for each of the four zones would be formed to carry out the 100 per cent verification. Each committee would have three members.

The Corporation did not have enough staff to match the volume of work or to make up an entire committee. Therefore, each committee would have one staff member and possibly two National Service Scheme volunteers from colleges or members from voluntary organisations. The volunteers would be provided with identity cards to show that they were authorised by the Corporation to assist it in the verification. The Corporation had fixed 30 days as the time-frame for the verification. But, this process and the creation of a database were expected to take two months. The tax collection, however, would not be held up till the completion of the verification all over the city, the revenue wing official said. As and when fresh assessments were done on the basis of the new rates, building owners could pay the tax.

The All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and the Bharatiya Janata Party boycotted the all-party meeting. Leader of the AIADMK in the Council P. Rajkumar said the tax increase was not acceptable during times of high inflation. The tax increase was first opposed by the DMK, an ally of the Congress whose member was the Mayor. But, the increase was made because of the pressure of raising funds for major schemes under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission, he said.

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