Individual property tax bills now

Mumbai: A civic decision to issue separate property tax bills will make life easier for new flat owners in the city.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) new norm that helps bypass housing societies or builders is applicable to new constructions that have received an occupation certificate (OC) from April 1.

“This will enable citizens to pay their property tax bills individually without depending on their society. It will also help them avoid fine or action by the civic body for a delay in paying property tax. They will also be able to reap the benefits of schemes like ‘early bird discount’ for the early tax payment,” said additional municipal commissioner Sanjay Mukherjee.

According to civic officials, the earlier system was to charge property tax on the entire building or housing society. However, if there was a delay in payment due to internal disputes in society, the fine had to be shared by even those who had deposited the bill amount to the society on time. In case of a delay in property tax payment by a certain flat owner for a long time, the other members were made to suffer from it.

Even now, citizens can pay property tax individually. But for this, they have to obtain a no-objection certificate from their housing society.

There have also been disputes between the new societies and developers over who would pay the property tax. “Since the BMC has now decided to issue separate property tax bill to every flat holder, the responsibility of paying property tax of vacant flats would remain with the builder. After the flat is sold, the society or the owner will have to pay the property tax,” said Mr Mukherjee.

However, the BMC will continue to issue the tax bill for common amenities in the name of society. If the society has not been formed, the developer will have to pay the bill, he added.

Welcoming the decision, Dr Nazar Abbas from Highland Court Coope-rative Society at Bandra (west) said that it would ensure that the burden of the errant flat owners was not passed on the flat owners who paid their dues to the society regularly. “The move will ensure that the BMC can take action directly against the defaulters and the entire society would be spared the threat of being seized for recovery of taxes,” said Dr Abbas.

Obtaining noc gets easier

In Mumbai, there are 2.75 lakh structures that have 28 lakh tenements, on which property tax is charged. Of 28 lakh tenements, nearly 1.42 lakh flat owners have already made property tax bills on their names by obtaining NoC from their societies. As per the new policy, all flat owners in new constructions will receive property tax bills separately. To make the process of obtaining the NoC easy, the BMC has issued all city buildings a 15-number ‘Unique Identity Number’, which is mentioned on the property tax bills.