The Hindu : New Delhi News : MCD to seal property of defaulting schools

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Aug 08, 2008
ePaper | Mobile/PDA Version

New Delhi

New Delhi

MCD to seal property of defaulting schools

Staff Reporter

Earlier drive to initiate these coercive measures had proved unsuccessful

Property tax arrears amounting to over Rs.15 crore due from 283 MCD schools
Being a public utility building, schools should not be charged a higher tax: NPSC chairman

NEW DELHI: Schools in the Capital which refuse to pay up their property tax dues would now be liable to face freezing of their bank accounts or auction of their movable assets. A proposal to this effect has been mooted at a meeting of the Standing Committee of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi.

According to MCD officials, the civic body had already prepared a list of 283 defaulting schools and issued notices to initiate these coercive measures earlier but the drive proved unsuccessful because of various procedural difficulties.

“So far we have not been able to freeze the bank accounts of any school as we are facing difficulty in getting hold of the bank account numbers.

“Moreover, the attachment issue in respect of the auctioning option of school property is creating hurdles in implementing the procedure,” said an MCD official.

Municipal Councillor Sarita Chaudhary said: “This list has been pending with the officials for the past four months but no action has been taken by the MCD officials.

“The list itself is incomplete and excludes the names of several defaulting schools.”

Asking the MCD officials to speed up matters, MCD Standing Committee chairman Vijender Gupta said: “The required bank account numbers can be obtained from the Income-Tax Department and the proceedings can be initiated soon after.”

According to the civic body, property tax arrears amounting to over Rs.15 crore are due from 283 MCD schools across the Capital.

Mr. Gupta on Thursday handed over a list of outstanding property tax dues of various schools to the National Progressive Schools Conference (NPSC) chairman, S.L. Jain, and requested him to clear them immediately.

The NPSC delegation apprised Mr. Gupta of various disputes over the amount of property tax due against various schools that was causing delay in payment.

Mr. Jain said: “We are mainly disputing the fact that being a public utility building, schools should not be charged a higher tax.”

Panel to settle matter

To settle the matter, Mr. Gupta said a committee under his chairmanship would be constituted in which the Additional Commissioner (Revenue) and Assessor and Collector along with delegates of the NPSC would sit together to resolve the dispute and accurately work out the property tax dues for payment.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

New Delhi