Board to monitor property tax |
| Posted: 13 Jan 2011 01:19 PM PST Patna, Jan. 13: Bihar would soon have a property tax board in place which would play an advisory role for urban local bodies to sort out issues pertaining to the levy. A decision to this effect was taken at a high level meeting held today under the chairmanship of deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi. Urban development department minister Prem Kumar, principal secretary Girish Shanker and other senior officials of the department were present at the meeting. Explaining the role of the board, a senior official of the urban development department said it would play an advisory role in fixing the rates of property tax by different local bodies. He said the Bihar Municipal Act, 2007, has provisions explaining the criteria for fixing property tax in different localities of a given urban centre. But most of the urban local bodies don't have the expertise to fix the taxes which would be acceptable to people even after revision, he said. Citing an example, the official said, the rate of property tax in Patna was fixed in 1993 and since then no revision has been done. "As the board would have experts as its members, it can help the urban local bodies while deciding on the issue of tax revision," he said. Modi directed the department officials to study the property tax collection system of some well performing states and submit a report within a month. The deputy chief minister underlined the need for having a property tax fixation system in place which should be transparent, simple and easy to implement. He also directed the department officials to expedite the work of the GIS (Geographic Information System) mapping of 26 towns of Bihar so that correct information about all houses in these places could be collected. A decision to carry out an extensive survey of all households of Patna for finding out the details and nature of its uses could also be ascertained. A directive was issued for expediting the holding tax collection work in areas falling under different urban local bodies and to have such a system in place using which owners could pay the cess conveniently. An important decision pertaining to giving concessions to those willing to pay holding tax in one go in advance was also taken. Those paying their holding taxes in advance in one go till June would be given a rebate of 15 per cent of the amount which they are likely to pay as holding tax. Those paying it till September would not be charged any extra money, whereas those opting to pay after September would have to pay 2 per cent monthly fine. The system of giving rebate on advance payment of holding tax was introduced during the NDA I rule in Bihar and at that time Modi himself held the charge of the urban development department. It had paid rich dividends as several house owners took benefit of the scheme and the revenue collection under the holding tax head had witnessed a healthy growth. Reviewing the functioning of the state housing board, Modi directed the board's managing director, Anupam Kumar Suman, to visit states like Bengal and Rajasthan and study the functioning of housing boards there. The officer has been asked to submit a report after completing his study. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
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