Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati and Delhi’s Hotel Taj Palace are among over 6,800 individuals and institutions listed on the New Delhi Municipal Council’s website for default in payment of property tax.
According to the list, a total of 6,816 people or institutions owe property tax amounting to Rs.650 crore to the civic body as on April 1 this year.
The figures were revealed in a Right to Information reply and subsequently posted on the civic agency’s website. According to the list, the State Trading Corporation of India on Tolstoy Marg is the biggest defaulter with Rs.43.60 crore, followed by Hotel Taj Palace at Rs.42.54 crore.
The BSP supremo and UP Chief Minister owes Rs.31.76 lakh to the NDMC as tax on her property on Sardar Patel Marg, while the CPI(M), which owns a property on Bhai Veer Singh Marg, owes Rs.18 lakh to the agency.
Some of the prominent hotels — Maurya Sheraton (Rs.44 lakh), Samrat (Rs.20 crore), Hotel Janpath (Rs.6.9 crore) and Park (Rs.15 crore) – are also in the list.
There are at least 40 defaulters who owe more than Rs.1 crore each to the agency. Gymkhana Club owes Rs.2.65 crore while the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) owes Rs.1.24 crore.
A senior NDMC official said the arrears were cumulative and did not pertain to only a single year. In addition, the majority of cases are under dispute in court, he added.
NDMC spokesperson Anand Tewari said, “The posting of the list on our website is a mere act of putting the information of the accumulated list of property tax defaulters in the public domain as is required under the RTI Act as well. The civic agency’s efforts to recover these arrears, which include issuing notices or through amnesty schemes, are part of a separate administrative process mandated under the NDMC Act.”
