Vijayawada Municipal Corporation’s (VMC) ongoing property tax survey might have failed to meet the deadline, but it has definitely helped the officials in identifying nearly 6,000 under assessed and about 500 un-assessed properties in circle III alone.
The VMC was netting about Rs. 77 crore through property tax every year from the 1.82 lakh assessments in the city. With an aim to improve to property tax collections, VMC had launched the 15-day survey in February first week with the deadline for completion set as February 25. The deadline, however, could not be complied with as officials are learnt to have covered barely 25 per cent of the households in the city.
Confirming that the survey was progressing rather slowly, a senior official said the survey was now being conducted only in Circle III and would be completed in a week. The other two circles in the city would be covered by March 15.
There has been a hue and cry by opposition parties over the survey that wanted the corporation to shelve it. CPI (M) city secretary Ch. Babu Rao alleged that the corporation launched the survey to revise property tax in the city and burden the middle and lower income groups. He said officials ignored the corporates and rich who were evading tax for decades and intimidating the low and middle income groups.
However, Mayor Koneru Sridhar defended the survey claiming it was undertaken to streamline the property tax collection and identify under assessed and un-assessed properties.
Meanwhile, District Collector Babu.A wanted VMC to utilise latest technology in conducting the survey as it would help the corporation boost its annual revenue to close to Rs.650 crore. Last week, the Collector had conducted a meeting with a private company and discussed the modalities of utilising the lidar technology for conducting the survey.
A special vehicle equipped with five cameras would capture 3D and 2D images of different structures and a unique code would be given to each structure. This would help in compiling complete data of a structure, including its type whether commercial or residential, advertisement hoardings, roads, open plots and others and even identify under assessed and un-assessed structures.
Later, the respective division officials would assign the data and initiate action accordingly, Mr. Babu said during the meeting. “This was used in Hyderabad and it helped in increasing the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation’s revenue considerably and the same can be emulated here as well,” said Babu. A.
