A Property Identification (PID) number is required to be assigned to any property, whether it is ‘authorised’ or ‘unauthorised’, as per the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike Property Tax (Amendment) Rules, 2020, said the High Court of Karnataka.
Though the rules, amended with effect from September 1, 2020, empower the BBMP to enter the particulars of property tax in Form-A register in respect of ‘authorised’ properties and in Form-B register in respect of ‘unauthorised’ properties, assignment of PID number for both the categories of properties is needed, the court said.
Justice M. Nagaprasanna passed the order while disposing of petitions filed by Madhusudhan Bhadri and others.
The petitioners had questioned inclusion of their property in Form-B claiming that it was contrary to an earlier judgment of the High Court. However, the BBMP pointed out that though the court in 2014 had declared that property tax particulars cannot be categorised into Form-A and Form-B as per then existing law, but it gave liberty to BBMP to amend the law.
Following the liberty given by the court, the rules were amended in 2020 making provision for maintaining property tax particulars in Form-A and Form-B, the civic body pointed out.
After going through the amended rules defining ‘authorised’ and ‘unauthorised’ properties, the court directed the BBMP to assess the properties of the petitioners to take a decision whether they will have to be entered in Form-A or Form-B. The court also directed the BBMP to issue PID numbers to the properties of the petitioners as per the rules.
