Proposal to seize & auction properties to recover taxes tabled in AMC

Aurangabad, July 28:

In a surprising development, the civic authorities have tabled a proposal of seizing properties and auctioning them to recover the property tax and water tax dues, which has been tabled before the Aurangabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) administration, recently. This proposal is made after going through the recovery pattern implemented by Mumbai and Nashik Municipal Corporations. Meanwhile, the AMC administrator has not given the nod, but the decision would be taken upon it, before the election of a new body and intervention of political persons.

It is observed that the citizens are relaxed as they were aware that the AMC would not be taking any action if they do not pay the property tax as well as water tax. However, the dearth of money in the exchequer has pushed the civic body to face a financial crunch. The AMC is facing financial imbalance for the past many years. Its expenses are more than the earnings. Hence the civic administrator A K Pandey took drastic steps to improve the financial situation. He ordered the tax assessment section officials to undertake a study in connection with the strategy framed by other municipal corporations in the state to recover the outstanding. The study underwent for 3-4 months. Later on, the proposal of seizing the properties and auctioning them has come up. The Mumbai and Nasik Municipal Corporations are working on the same lines for the past many years.

Pandey said, " The proposal to seize properties has been tabled before me, but the study upon it has not been completed, so far. The announcement of the same will be made after taking a final decision. Presently, I had not taken any decision upon the issue."

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AMC dues toll Rs 512 crore

There are 2.72 lakh properties in the city. The types of properties and dues from them (in bracket) are as follows: Residential - 2,25,714 (Rs 308 crore), Commercial - 23,447 (Rs 145 cr), Industrial - 753 (Rs 07 cr), Semi-commercial - 5,512 (Rs 30 cr), Educational - 333 (Rs 17 cr), Government offices - 129 (Rs 05 cr). Hence from 2.72 lakh properties the AMC has to recover dues of Rs 512 crore.

There are more than 1,000 properties upon whom the recovery of taxes is more than Rs 10 lakh and the big non-taxpayers are commercial property-holders. Although, the AMC offers discounts in penalty and interest, but is in vain. The figures of outstanding is increasing each year. Hence the time will tell whether the AMC would take the decision of seizing the properties or not?