Mumbai: The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) has booked a suspended officer of the Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) and two of his subordinates for allegedly causing a loss of ₹681.6 crore to the corporation by fudging property tax records to favour tax payers.
According to ACB officials, the accused have been identified as Prakash Kulkarni, Dinesh Gawari and Kishore Dhole. Kulkarni, till his suspension in May last year, was serving as the tax assessor and collector with the NMMC, while Gawari and Dhole are employed as accountant and computer operator.
The FIR was registered on Wednesday after completion of an open inquiry initiated by the ACB last year. “We were conducting an open inquiry into the irregularities in the property tax collected by the NMMC. Kulkarni was serving in his post for 20 years and was in charge of assessment and collection of property tax. Inquiries have revealed that Kulkarni deliberately collected decreased amounts of land under construction (LUC) tax and property tax from land owners. According to our inquiries, 2,618 of the total 3,301 property owners in Navi Mumbai have paid property tax far less than they are liable for, leading to a loss of ₹681.6 crore,” said Superintendent of Police Balkrishna Sawant, ACB.
LUC tax is levied on a person as soon as he takes land from the local authority (CIDCO in this case) for construction, be it residential or commercial, and the NMMC does not issue a no objection certificate (NOC) unless the LUC tax is paid. Officials said the investigating team has found evidence in the ACB records that only a pittance was charged as the LUC tax to the 2,618 people in question before the NOC was issued.
“To stop the discrepancies from coming out, Kulkarni sent an email to a private firm that manages the generation and printing of property tax bills, asking it to exclude the bills of the people he had favoured. As the bills were never printed, the discrepancies were never noticed by anyone else in the NMMC,” said Mr. Sawant.
After the construction is complete, the ward officer prepares a tabulated ward report (TWR), which is an assessment of the property tax that the property is liable for. Kulkarni allegedly fudged the TWRs submitted to his office, showing a far lesser amount than the actual property tax liability, said officials. “Our inquiries have shown that Gawari was involved in fudging the LUC tax records, while Dhole manipulated the TWRs. We have booked all three under the Prevention of Corruption Act, and searches are under way at several properties in Navi Mumbai,” said Mr. Sawant.
According to ACB sources, the agency has received information of Kulkarni owning several benami properties, including two cinema halls in Navi Mumbai, which are currently being searched.
