BENGALURU: The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) authorities will resurvey all malls and tech parks across the city to verify the built-up area as declared under the Self-Assessment of property tax Scheme (SAS). The initiative is being taken up to calculate the actual amount to be paid as property tax.
The fund-starved civic agency is expecting to rake in a huge revenue from this move. In this financial year (2016-17), BBMP collected about Rs 1,800 crore as property tax against a target of Rs 2,500 crore.
BBMP officials said the main reason for not meeting the target was because property owners don’t pay as per the actual measurement of the property or default on tax payment.
Speaking to Express, chairperson of the BBMP Standing Committee on Taxation and Finance, M K Gunashekar, said that a few weeks back, BBMP revenue officials conducted a resurvey of nine tech parks and one mall in the city.
“We found a difference of almost Rs 250 crore, including tax and penalty amount that is due to the Palike,” he said.
Further, Gunashekar said if they can find such a huge difference by re-surveying just 10 peoperties, it would be much more if all the major tech parks and malls across the city are taken into account.
He added that there are 40 malls and 70 tech parks in BBMP limits. “We have written to BBMP Commissioner Manjunath Prasad regarding this. To begin with, four tech parks in Mahadevapura will be resurveyed by BBMP along with a private agency. Later, other malls and tech parks will also be re-surveyed,” he said.
“If we get a clear picture of the tax amount which we can actually generate, we can include it in the BBMP budget,” said Gunashekar, who will be presenting the budget. BBMP is planning to present its budget soon after the state budget in March.
“In many cases, a ward engineer will know the details of big properties in his/her ward. They might be working hand in glove with the owners of the malls or tech parks. Depsite knowing that the owner has violated norms, the ward engineer may not have raised the issue,” said a BBMP official. He added, “The re-survey will show the actual built-up area and thereby the property tax owed. Many such properties belong to political leaders who have given false declarations on built-up area.”