Following up on its warning that it would take a tough stand against property tax defaulters, the civic body locked up Mantri Square in Malleswaram for around seven hours on Wednesday over non-payment of property tax.
According to senior BBMP officials, the property tax dues from the mall exceed ₹30 crore, including the penalty for three years. The mall developers had issued a cheque for ₹10 crore, which had bounced, said a civic official.
A senior revenue official told The Hindu that the BBMP had already issued a show cause notice and a distress warrant around two months ago. However, with no response from the mall, the BBMP locked the premises from around 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
The civic body’s legal cell had begun proceedings to file criminal charges against the mall developers over the bounced cheque. “We will once again lock the mall premises sometime next week,” the official added.
A representative of Mantri Mall said, “We are in touch with the authorities and working with them to resolve the issue.”
Incidentally, this is not the first time the mall has been in the news. Early last year, the Regional Commissioner had ruled that the land on which Mantri Square and Mantri Greens apartment stand belonged to the BBMP and had directed the civic body to take possession of the land. The then commissioner B.H. Anil Kumar had said a survey would be undertaken to re-ascertain the extent of encroachment.
Pending dues
The civic body has collected more than ₹2,508 crore as property tax. Though the target is ₹3,500 crore, revenue officials said the civic body may be able to mop up around ₹2,800 core by the end of this fiscal.
Zonal officials have already been instructed to focus on collection of pending tax dues from the defaulters. The civic chief had directed the zones to identify the top defaulters and recover from them on priority.
