Nagpur: Even though no new taxes or increase in existing taxes were announced in the Nagpur Municipal Corporation standing committee’s budget presented on June 27, a proposal to increase property tax by 10% has been placed on agenda for the committee’s first meeting after the budget presentation, to be held on July 10.According to the proposal, the hike is expected to generate an additional 15.42 crore revenue for the NMC. Property tax department has submitted the proposal as part of the annual revision of tax rates.It now remains to be seen whether standing committee chairperson Shivani Dani approves the hike or not. While presenting the budget, Dani had asserted that no additional tax burden had been imposed on the city’s residents.Under Section 99 of Maharashtra Municipal Corporation Act, which empowers the civic body to determine tax rates, the proposal seeks approval of revised property tax rates for the current financial year. As per rules, the proposal should ordinarily have been approved in February. However, since the standing committee budget itself was presented late, officials said any approved increase could be recovered by adding the revised amount to the next property tax bills.The proposal also seeks to increase sewerage benefit tax from 1% to 2% and fire tax from 1% to 2%. Overall, the property tax department estimates that the revisions will result in an average 10% increase in property tax collections.However, the proposal does not recommend any change in the state education cess, employment guarantee cess, or large residential building tax.
