Team Herald
CUNCOLIM: The Cuncolim Municipal Council’s decision to reassess the house tax has raised the many an eye brow in the town, with people even taking to the social media to debate the issue.
If the tone and tenor of the raging debate on the social media is any indication, the decision of the municipality to reassess the house tax would face a stiff opposition from the residents of the town.
Many residents, through their social media posts, have warned the council not to go ahead with reassessment work. However, the Council has already issued a public notice on the newspapers announcing the reassessment of house tax.
Municipal Engineer Deepak Faldessai told Herald that the house tax must be reassessed once in four years. “The Council has not done this exercise for the past 25 years. There is a need for reassessment of the house tax; as such, the councillors have resolved to carry out the exercise. We are only implementing the council’s decision. There is nothing wrong in this process. We hope that the citizens will cooperate with us in this matter,” he said.
Faldesai said that there was a huge defect in the house tax regime: recently built houses pay huge tax, while the older ones pay much lower tax. Giving an example, he said, “In one ward, there are two bungalows; one was constructed recently and its owner is paying Rs 1500 as house tax per annum, while the older one is paying just Rs 100. This shows that the need for reassessment of the house tax.”
The Council has also decided to asses all illegal houses to tax. “If we levy house tax on illegal houses, we will get more revenue,” Faldesai said.
Rebutting a prevalent argument that once house tax is levied on an illegal house it would become legal, Faldesai said, “Assessing an illegal house to tax does not mean that house will become legal. Secondly, by this data it will help us to collect garbage fees.”
Social activist Rony Dias ridiculed the council for failing to reassess the house tax periodically by asking, “Was the council sleeping for last twenty five years?”
“If this is in act that needs to be done every four years, then, they should have done it long back. How can you suddenly increase house tax by thousand percent?” he deplored.
Slamming the council for failing to generate income from its properties, Dias said, “The Council wants the people to pay for its failures; since the council failed to generate revenue to pay the salaries of its employees, it wants pass the burden on the people. We will not allow this to happen.”
