Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) across the State have so far collected only ₹809 crore property tax and ₹127 crore water tax against the total target of ₹2,625 crore in the current fiscal year.
In the other taxes too, which included trade licence fee, lease fee, and vacant land, the ULBs were lagging.
All the 110 ULBs have collected only ₹459 crore till date against ₹932 crore collected during the corresponding period the previous year, according to the data available on the Municipal Administration Department’s Revenue Dashboard.
All the ULBs are expected to collect property tax of ₹2,245 crore and water tax of ₹380 crore this fiscal. But so far, only ₹809 crore (36%) and ₹127 crore (33%) respectively have been collected.
According to the reports, RINL, Visakhapatnam, TTD, Dargah Hazrat Ghalib Shaheed, Vijayawada, are the top defaulters with crores of dues pending since years.
The top 100 defaulters in the State owe ₹528 crore to their respectively ULBs towards property tax.
Among the ULBs, the Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation could collect only ₹202 crore property tax against the target of ₹921 crore. Similarly, the Vijayawada Municipal Corporation collected only ₹87 crore out of ₹269 crore target and the Guntur Municipal Corporation collected only ₹58 crore out of ₹191 crore target.
Officials say that the ensuing municipal elections have kept the municipal officials busy.
“Many higher officials are involved in the ward secretariat work and municipal election work due to which there is no great focus on tax collection. However, we have sent teams to the doorsteps of taxpayers to remind them of the dues,” said a revenue wing official in the VMC.
Efforts would be made to encourage payment of dues by the citizens, the official said.
