TEAM HERALD
MARGAO: Thirteen years after the civic body assessed around 9000 households for tax based on plinth area instead of carpet area, the exercise has come back to haunt the Margao Municipal Council once again.
These 9000 households spread across the town are still a discriminated lot, as they still pay 20 per cent more tax than their counterparts for no fault of theirs.
In fact, when former MMC chairperson Savio Coutinho took up the matter with Urban Development Minister, Francis D’Souza during his visit to the civic body on Thursday, the deputy chief minister wondered how only a group of citizens have to pay additional house tax compared to the general citizens. D’Souza immediately asked the chief officer to look into the grievance and get the same rectified at the earliest.
The 9000 households were made to pay a higher house tax after the then municipal body in August 1998 decided to calculate house tax in the commercial capital based on the plinth area instead of carpet area. What’s interesting to note is that though the civic body later reverted back to the old system of calculating the house tax based on carpet area to protect the interest of a prominent builder, the 9000 households continues to pay the tax calculated on the plinth area.
Attempts made by the Civic body to mete out justice to these 9000 lot have come a cropper for reasons best known to the Civic administration. Though these households never called for a refund of the tax amount, their requests to adjust the payments have also found no favour with the administration.
Says Savio Coutinho: “This is grave injustice on these 9000 households. Why should only they pay a higher tax based on plinth area, while others enjoys house tax based on carpet area. Hope the Margao Municipal Administration take instructions of the Urban Development Minister to its logical conclusion”.
