BHUBANESWAR: In a bid to scale up its revenue, the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) mulls to tie up with Commissionerate of Police for detecting holding tax evaders.
BMC has already written a letter to DCP Satyabrata Bhoi for information on people who have given their houses on rent.
The evaders are likely to be fined from January, 2016 for the violation. While the civic body is spending crores of rupees on development initiatives, it receives a meagre sum from citizens in form of holding tax, a senior BMC official said.
The residents who have listed their houses as rented ones with the Commissionerate of Police but concealed the information from BMC or made an under-assessment of the same will be penalised. Recently, the Commissionerate of Police had directed denizens to submit details of tenants and a database of house owners was created. A feedback mechanism was also started in which house owners suggested ways and means to check crime, especially involving senior citizens across the city.
BMC’s Additional Commissioner Sudhansu Mohan Samal said, “BMC would initiate serious action against those people who take all benefits from the civic body but in return are doing a little towards paying the taxes.”
The Corporation is losing out on revenue due to holding tax evasion from citizens who have put their house on rent. As per rough estimation, while there are around one lakh holdings in the city, less than one-fourth of the number is actually shown as commercial or rental. “City’s civic requirements have become high and through an effective tax base, those can be fulfilled,” Samal added.