Chennai, April 6 (BPNS)
The opposition AIADMK has locked horns with the ruling DMK in Tamil Nadu over the announcement that property taxes will be hiked property tax. AIADMK held protest marches across the state on Tuesday against the rise in property tax with both the Chief Coordinator, O. Panneerselvam, and Joint Coordinator, Edappadi K. Palaniswami leading the marches at Chennai and Tiruchi respectively.
O. Panneerselvam while speaking to BPNS said, “The previous AIADMK government had hiked the property tax but when the then opposition leader M.K. Stalin called for a rollback of the taxes, we had obliged and rolled back in 2019. The government also had said that the property tax paid would be adjusted with the future bills.”
The former Chief Minister said that the DMK was showing its double standards by hiking the property tax and that if the government does not roll back the prices, the opposition would conduct regular protest marches across the state against this.
Countering the argument of AIADMK, the Tamil Nadu Municipal administration minister, K.N. Nehru in a statement on Wednesday said that taxes were revised based on the 15th Finance commissions recommendations to fix minimum floor rates for property tax as mandated by the Government of India.
He said that out of the 77.87 lakhs houses in the state, only 1.09 lakh (1.4 percent) will witness a property tax hike of 150 percent. The minister in the statement said that of the 44.53 lakh households, 58.48 percent will see an increase of 25 percent and 24.70 percent will have a hike of 50 percent.
He charged AIADMK with duplicity and said that in 1987, the AIADMK government had increased the property tax by 300 percent and said that during that time property tax was hiked by 100 percent for own houses, 200 percent for rented houses, and 300 percent for commercial spaces and industries.
K.N. Nehru said that the AIADMK government in 1993 also increased property tax by 50 percent for own houses, 100 percent for rented houses, 150 percent for industries, and 200 percent for commercial spaces. The Minister said that the DMK government that followed AIADMK government in 1998 hiked property taxes by 25 percent for own houses, 50 percent for rented houses, 100 percent for industries, and 150 percent for commercial spaces.
He said that the hike in property taxes will come into effect in the first quarter of the financial year 2022-23 in the state and added that local bodies will have to pass resolution in this regard.
The minister while speaking to BPNS said, “ The property tax hike will come into effect in the first quarter of the financial year 2022-23. There is no merit in the opposition AIADMK creating a ruckus over property tax hike as I have told earlier the successive governments had gone for property tax hike. Everyone knows that the property tax in Tamil Nadu is not as high as in several other states of the country.”
