NEW DELHI: The city residents have raised a red flag on the latest direction by the civic corporation of mandatorily geo-tagging the properties by the owners to avail the rebate in house tax, saying that the nature is “threatening” and seems “passing the onus” of carrying out a drive to the residents instead civic officials.
“Municipal Corporation of Delhi directs citizens to geotag themselves of their properties by January 31, 2023, using a mobile app against the Property ID allotted previously while filing property tax returns, otherwise they will be deprived of the annual rebates. It is threatening and depriving its genuine trustworthy taxpayers to follow dictates and the rest who are not registered and pay go scot-free. Delhi Jal Board and DISCOMS are also undertaking somewhat similar exercise to our knowledge and information,” the United Residents Joint Action (URJA), a consortium of over 2,500 RWAs said in a statement.
The association said the initiative is impractical as the municipal server is unable to handle such huge volume of transactions while the move, possibly taken by other agencies as well, will force the residents to register themselves on multiple platforms making it a cumbersome exercise. It also suggested a uniform geotagging by all the agencies to avoid carrying out the exercise repeatedly by the users.
“Members of the RWAs and civil society feel that such unpractical initiatives that requires involvement of each individual resident owners across the whole city, where agencies involved does not want to engage in an exercise at their end but look forward to people to obey their dictates without any valid reasons and without any technical assistance confirms their non- serious approach towards achieving the goal. Besides the municipal server also is not equipped to deal with such large transactions on daily basis and most of the time is not functioning,” it said
“URJA suggests that all utilities service shall be geotagged jointly with its link to the Municipal Unique Property Identification Code [UPIC] Number to avoid multiple ID’s allotment against one property,” the association added. Earlier this month, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) announced a mandatory geotagging of all kinds of properties.
“Taxpayers who fail to geotag their properties by January 31 will not be able to avail 10 per cent rebate on lump sum advance payment of tax in the next financial year,” it stated. Recently, the MCD organised several training camps across the city to create awareness among the citizens regarding the needs and benefits of geo-tagging of their properties and to provide practical training about the geo-tagging process.
Sahbhagita scheme that envisages active participation of the resident welfare associations (RWAs) in the city to enhance tax collection and improve waste management was also made familiar.
‘No rebate if properties not tagged’
Earlier this month, the MCD announced a mandatory geotagging of all kinds of properties. Taxpayers who fail to geotag their properties by January 31 will not be able to avail 10 per cent rebate on lump sum advance payment of tax in the next financial year, it stated.