CUTTACK: The Cuttack Municipal Corporation (CMC) has decided to pull down hoardings of 52 advertisement agencies for default in payment of tax.
The civic body’s move comes in the wake of the failure of advertisement agencies concerned to turn up even after repeated reminders for remittance of arrears.
Sources said CMC had issued demand notices amounting to `1,25,74,184 to 52 agencies with a request to remit the same as early as possible. However, though more than a year has passed, the civic body is yet to receive any payment in this regard.
More than half of the notices were returned unserved to CMC as there were no whereabouts of the advertisement agencies. The civic body has been able to receive only 25 per cent of the total outstanding hoarding tax arrears, the sources added.
The issue was hotly debated in the meeting of the standing committee of CMC on Monday following which the authorities of the civic body decided to remove the hoardings and float fresh tenders for the same within July 31.
The meeting also decided to divide the entire area under CMC into four zones for smooth conduct of tender process for advertisement hoardings. The CMC decided to undertake a drive to remove illegal hoardings of the 52 agencies from April 15.
The CMC will serve notices to other advertisement agencies to remit their hoarding tax payments by June 31. If the agencies fail to comply within the set time period, their hoardings will be removed, CMC Commissioner Gyana Ranjan Das said.