No merger till HSG projects make pending tax payments: Villages

Elected members from the grampanchayat of two villages have made it clear that unless big housing projects that have come up in their jurisdiction pay taxes owed to them they wonrsquot merge with PMC They are claiming that housing projects like Nanded City Nanded Village and Amanora special township project Sadesataranali have been evading taxes since the last two years and the arrears runs into crores of rupees Taxing issue Amanora Park Special Township City located at Sadesataranali village PICSImzanglu Aier ldquoWe want our dues to be cleared and only then we will take a call on the merger with PMC The housing projects were built after receiving sanction from the district collector but the grampanchayats have no means to recover taxesrdquo said Shobha Abhyankar woman sarpanch Nanded villageu00a0ldquoOver 1000 people reside at Nanded City on 700 acres of our land The project has already completed two years and we havenrsquot got a single paisa as a tax But if we merge with the PMC they will pay taxes to the civic body and therefore we are against the mergerrdquo Abhyankar added u00a0A P Gawde grampanchayat officer Nanded village said ldquoGrampanchayat computes tax on the basis of the size of the project and total number of housing or business establishments As per our calculations the amount owed would be approximately Rs 4 crore per year and so far we have not received anything from the Nanded City project Instead we are loosing revenuerdquo Abhyankar said ldquoTill date we only received Rs 3 crore from Nanded City project towards land purchase revenue stamp duty They havenrsquot even made their stand clear why they are not paying the property tax or grampanchayat tax which should be paid every year nor have they replied to our letters or queries The distressing part is that these project offices do not even entertain our grampanchayat officials when we communicate with themrdquo Same situation Roopesh Tupe deputy sarpanch of Sadesataranali village in Hadapsar said ldquoWe are yet to recover Rs 9 crore dues from Amanora Park Township City which is located on 450 acres of land in the village jurisdiction The unpaid dues have hampered several developmental works Earlier we also issued a notice to the Mall owned by the Amanora for nonpayment of grampanchayat taxes Sadesatranali deputy sarpanch Roopesh Tupe right Nanded sarpanch Shobha Abhyankar The Rural Development ministry however intervened and the issue is still pending Even a one day hunger strike at the Mall yielded no resultsrdquo u00a0Joining the chorus against the tax evasion Vijay Kumbhar president Surajya Sangharsha Samiti an NGO said ldquoThis is a wrong practice to avoid tax to the concerned grampanchayats No mega housing projects or special townships are special entities and there is no provision of any tax exemption to them These projects are already at an advantage due to government sops and if they still donrsquot want to pay the tax it is unethical The grampanchayat should approach the court in this matterrdquou00a0Maj Gen SCN Jatar president Nagri Chetana Manch an NGO said ldquoThere is no respect for the law at any level Evading taxes is wrong and the government should take proper actionrdquo Vikas Deshmukh Pune district collector said ldquoThough we have permitted construction of these housing projects and special townships the Grampanchayat tax or property tax in rural area is applicable as per the Grampanchayat Act The special townships have argued for tax exemptions only because of the housing in special category We have now put forward the issue to the State Urban Development Department that is headed by the C M Prithviraj Chavan We are expecting a result soonrdquo The other side Satish Magar Managing Director Nanded City said ldquoIt is wrong to say that there was no interaction with the Nanded grampanchayat I am doing my work by taking everyone in confidence As a developer we have a responsibility to maintain and operate a township by making provision of water supply roads sewerage treatment and other required infrastructural developments to these mega housing projects We are not putting any such infrastructural pressure on these grampanchayats We had already paid one per cent refund from the Stamp Duty to the grampanchyat A special committee formed by the government on the issue will take a decision soon on whether to pay tax or not We are bound to do as per their directivesrdquo Aniruddha Deshpandeu00a0 Managing Director Amanora Special Township said ldquoAs per the Supreme Court the word lsquotaxrsquo it can be recovered if you are providing a service We are not taking anything from the grampanchyat including water water treatment plant garbage disposal system and sewerage treatment plant As per the special township policy an urban local body could be formed in the township Incidentally the government had put a stay on the issue of paying taxes to the grampanchayats in such a situation A threemember committee has been formed and they will take a decision We will certainly follow the directives provided by the committee If the committee asks to pay taxes we shall do itrdquou00a0 Factsheet 20000 plusu00a0Nanded Population 48125 hectares Rs 1520 Lakhu00a0Land cost per guntha Rs 25003000u00a0Construction cost