Team Herald
PONDA: Giving a huge relief to the residents of Ponda, the local municipal council on Monday deferred proposed hike in taxes and will look for alternative sources to increase its revenues.
The Ponda Municipal Council (PMC) also passed a surplus budget of little over Rs 14 crore with total revenue expected was Rs 78.64 crore, while expenditure was projected at Rs 64.36 Crore.
It may be recalled at a special meeting of the PMC in October 2022, it had proposed to hike the house tax and commercial tax manifold to compensate for their revenue deficit it was facing. The move had upset Ponda locals, who called the drastic hike unfair.
House tax was been hiked from Rs 7 per sq mt to Rs 15 per sq mt, while commercial tax was hiked from Rs 20 to Rs 100. For new constructions, house tax was hiked from Rs 7 to Rs 50 per sq.mt and from Rs 50 to Rs 206 per sq.mt for new commercial buildings.
The decision was justified by the Council that time, saying it was struggling to compensate for revenue deficit and also there was no hike in taxes for several years. However as the decision to hike the taxes were deferred. The taxes would be charged at old rates.
The PMC also decided to re-auction Sopo tender as there weren’t any bidders. The initial bid was for Rs 63 lakh, including GST and there was no response thereafter. Hence, a fresh auction will be conducted at an initial bid of Rs 53 lakh, including GST.
Chairperson of PMC, Ritesh Naik also said that decision was taken to prohibit U-turn for heavy vehicles at Dada Vaidya Chowk to prevent accidents. The vehicles will have to go little ahead and take turn near the police station to arrive at the bus stand.
Discussions were also held on solving the garbage problem by outsourcing the collection work, as it could also help the labourers get their wages on time.
