The Hindu : Corporation clearance must for hoardings

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Aug 10, 2002

Southern States

Southern States - Tamil Nadu-Chennai

Corporation clearance must for hoardings

By Karthik Subramanian

CHENNAI Aug. 9. In an advisory to advertisers, the Chennai Corporation yesterday asked agencies to take a `clearance' from it before displaying advertisement hoardings.

Also, those hoardings that have not applied for regulation would be brought down. (More than 3,600 applications for hoardings are pending ratification by the civic agency since June 2001.)

The guidelines follow media reports of mushrooming of new hoardings in the city in recent times. According to the AIADMK ruling party whip, M.R. Kesavan, one Madasamy of Mylapore owns more than 25 `illegal' hoardings in and around the Adyar area. Apart from this, there have been reports of new hoardings coming up at the Kotturpuram area.

According to the Corporation officials, this would be the first step towards regulating the hoarding industry in the city. The `clearance' would also entail a closer look at the exact revenue being generated by the industry.

Currently, several advertisers continue to pay an advertisement tax of 25 paisa per square feet, even though the Corporation revised it to Rs.2 and Rs. 3 through a council resolution in October 1998.

The Tamil Nadu Outdoor Advertising Association deemed the increase in tax as `impractical' and stated that the increased rates had never been demanded by the Corporation officials until recently. Further the civic agency had not assessed the hoardings for several years now and hence cannot demand increased tax.

According to the Corporation records, it suffered a loss of Rs. 13 crore so far due to the underpayment of tax.

Now, the Corporation hopes to streamline the payment of taxes by asking even the MNCs to approach them to get a clearance for advertising in hoardings. This way only those hoardings paying tax under the revised rate would get the ``big fish''.

Further, those hoardings that are deemed physically `dangerous' would be pulled down as per the powers vested upon the Commissioner by the Section 258 of the Chennai City Municipal Corporation Act, 1919.

The Corporation has asked the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board to withdraw power connections to `illegal' hoardings.

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