The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) office
Credit: DH Photo
Bengaluru: At Rs 3,900 crore, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has just collected the highest property tax ever.
This is an increase of Rs 600 crore as compared to the last year. What’s more, for the first time, the revenue from Mahadevapura zone alone has breached the Rs 1,000 crore-mark.
A slew of reforms, including frequent reminders through SMSes and calls, sealing down premises of tax defaulters, confiscating moveable items have together contributed to the BBMP’s record collection, officials said. In the just concluded fiscal year, the civic body had also drafted standard operating procedures (SOPs) for handling tax defaulters, which was absent until then.
But the tough measures also came with a lot of backlash. While political parties opposed the BBMP for charging a penalty indiscriminately, the BBMP’s own staff held multiple protests and also threatened to remain absent en masse in protest of the “excess work”.
Instead of crumbling under pressure, the civic body came up with a one-time settlement scheme, which offered relief from penalty and heavy bank interest charges to tax defaulters.
Staff was placated with a promise to hire more people for the purpose of collecting revenue.
All of these reforms saw the light of the day after the state government posted Munish Moudgil as special commissioner (revenue) of the BBMP in October last year.
Buoyed by the success, the BBMP hopes to collect Rs 5,000 crore in 2024-25 by bringing left-out properties into the tax bracket and recovering about Rs 1,500 crore in tax arrears.