BENGALURU: Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) said that it has found an evasion of Rs 370 crore in property tax by nearly 10,000 properties.
Special Commissioner (Revenue & IT) Munish Moudgil said that, using GIS technology and drone imagery, they have found that owners’ self-assessed declared property tax is lower than the actual area and use.
“GBA IT, along with NIC (National Informatics Centre) and the GPS Team under City Corporations, which took up house-to-house visits, has used ‘property visit information’ along with the ‘property GPS’ and ‘drone image of each property’ to identify tax evasion,” Moudgil said.
He said that about 49,000 notices have been served as each property has given less tax for about five years on average.
Moudgil said that citizens can pay the property tax immediately online at https://BBMPtax.karnataka.gov.in or can also appeal online at https://BBMPenyaya.karnataka.gov.in within 15-days of notice. In one instance, the built-up area as per self-assessment was 2,800 square feet instead of the actual 5,459 square feet. As per the notice, the evaded property tax was Rs 7,933, with a cess of Rs 1,904.
A penalty equal to the evaded tax was also levied along with interest, giving 15 days time to respond to the show cause notice, failing which the notice would be confirmed and the owners had to pay the difference tax.
South City Corporation had the highest violators (5,141), followed by West City (3,420).