Greater Bengaluru Bill loaded with tax provisions

Bengaluru: The Greater Bengaluru Governance Bill, 2024, which was tabled in the Karnataka Legislative Assembly on Tuesday, is loaded with many new provisions to tax different stakeholders, including common citizens.

The prominent tax provisions include the Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) cess, development charges and entertainment tax, which are likely to draw flak from citizens.

The Congress government may be anticipating an increase in the administrative costs, once the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) is restructured. This is because the bill has provisions to create a Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) as an apex body, up to 10 corporations and provides for similar discretion regarding the number of wards in each municipal body.

Cheque list

Property tax

Greater Bengaluru Authority Cess

Entertainment tax

Advertisement charges

Infrastructure and urban land transport cess

User charges for water supply, drainage and sewerage, solid waste management

Parking fee for different types of vehicles in different areas and for different periods

Fee for stacking of materials or rubbish on public streets for construction, alteration, repair or demolition work

Fees and fines for performance of regulatory and other statutory functions

"Such percentage of the revenues of the city corporations within the Greater Bengaluru Area shall accrue to the Greater Bengaluru Authority, as recommended by the government," the bill states.

In the chapter on ‘taxation’, the bill empowers the city corporations to collect Greater Bengaluru Authority cess, which is likely to be shared with the GBA for meeting its administrative cost. The GBA has been proposed for coordinating and supervising the development of the Greater Bengaluru Area, besides undertaking large infrastructure works. But the Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) retains the land use and planning powers.

Levying of development charge is another new component in the bill meant for any residential building with a height of more than 14 metres, or any non-residential building. Development and redevelopment of any existing area will also come under this purview.

Another notable provision in the bill includes the collection of property tax by keeping the guidance value of the property as the base price. The BBMP had announced a similar method of computing tax, ahead of the 2024-25 financial year, but dropped the plan as citizens anticipated a two- to three-fold increase in their property tax.

The bill has also prescribed entertainment tax, which will be levied and collected over ticket-based entertainment, non-ticket based entertainment and televised entertainment.

The corporation can impose infrastructure cess, solid waste management cess and urban transport cess, but all of them may not be enforced as similar provisions were also part of the existing BBMP Act or the Karnataka Municipal Administration (KMC) Act.