CHENNAI: Responding to complaints from property owners in extended parts of the city, the corporation council on Monday, adopted a resolution to bring down basic street rates, a component in calculation of property taxes, in some extended areas to be on a par or lesser than that of core areas.
Property owners of extended areas like Alandur, Valasaravakkam, Madhavaram, Thiruvottiyur and Ambattur zones had raised objections to the recently introduced property tax revision stating that in some areas, the basic street rates is higher when compared to even core areas like Adyar and Teynampet.
According to the residents, while the basic street rates even in core city areas like Nungambakkam, Gopalapuram, Royapettah and T Nagar range from 0.90 to 1.50, it has been set to 2.56 in erstwhile Alandur Municipality.
They also sought to bring down BSR to Rs 1.25 which is prevalent on average in core areas. Taking the feedback into consideration, the basic street rates in extended areas will be set by comparing it to the nearest core city area. The street rates are to be lesser than the revised rates in the nearest core city areas but not be lesser than the existing rate in the core areas.
“The new basic street rates have already been recommended for extended areas but it will be finalised in the next two weeks,” a senior corporation official told TNIE. “When the property tax was revised in 2018, this was a major problem concerning those in extended areas. So, this change has been recommended,” the official added.
Taxation and Finance committee chairman Sarbajaya Das told TNIE, “In line with the standard basic street rates, the rates in extended areas have been reassessed to be on par or lower than the nearest core city area. When this comes to effect, some extended areas will even have no increase at all (of property taxes).”