HYDERABAD: The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) has surpassed previous records in terms of a collection of property tax as well as trade license fee under the ‘Early Bird scheme’.
On the last day of the scheme, GHMC has so far collected a whopping Rs 365 crore and the collection may increase further by Rs 10 crore to Rs 15 crore by Sunday night as Citizen Service Centres (CSCs) remained open till Sunday midnight in respective circle offices and people can also pay online. Last year, the property tax collection was `213 crore, while the trade license fee collection was to the tune of Rs 21.67 crore without penalty.
Almost 50 percent of the taxpayers paid property tax in a month itself by availing five per cent rebate on current year demand under the early bird scheme offer. Of the total 14.30 lakh properties around 3.30 lakh properties come under the exemption of below Rs 1,200 property tax. Last year (2016-17) during April, as many as 3,17,006 owners paid property tax and corporation collected Rs 213.03 crore.
Till Sunday evening some 5,16,491 people paid their tax for the current year ‘Early Bird’ Scheme 2017-18 and an amount of Rs 365 crore was collected. Compared to last year, two lakh more owners paid property tax this year and an amount of Rs 150 crore additional collections were made.
TRADE LICENCE FEE
In terms of trade license fee collection, there is marked improvement in the collections. During the current year, as many as 30,244 traders paid trade license fee to the tune of Rs 21.67 crore without penalty. This year, 12,000 more trades paid trade license fee compared to last year and additional Rs 8 crore was collected. More than 50 percent of total trade licence fee collected last year was collected in the month of April this year.