After 11 years, Trichy corporation has proposed to increase property tax of residential, commercial and industrial properties in the added area covering peripheral wards of the urban local body near Thiruverumbur.
Through the revision, property tax revenue for the corporation from the added area comprising six wards will approximately increase by 2.2 crore.
Ward numbers 38, 39, 40, 41, 42 and 43 (previously wards 61 to 65) were added to Trichy corporation in 2011 through a government order from the Municipal Administration department in September 2010.
The areas were formerly with Thiruverumbur town panchayat, Pappakurichi panchayat, Ellakudi panchayat, Keelakalkandar Kottai panchayat and Alathur panchayat.
According to the local body, the six wards ever since added to the city area were paying property tax as per the town panchayat and village panchayat tax slabs, much lower than the corporation’s property tax slabs followed in other wards. Attempts to revise and regularise an uniform property tax failed as residents told the local body to improve basic amenities before making a revision.
As per the study conducted by the corporation, a sum of 160 crore was invested in the added area since the merger. However, property tax revenue from the areas in the corresponding period including tax arrears, stood at 24.5 crore. The local body felt a mismatch between revenue and expenditure in the added areas.
“The ward committee comprising councillors was aware of the revision, and amenities developed in the added areas in the last 11 years were listed before them. The six wards covering Thiruverumbur and Kattur are highly urbanised now, several commercial complexes have come up on the Trichy-Thanjavur NH in the last two years,” a senior corporation official said.
As per the property tax revision proposed based on the property area, residential properties will be paying 1 to 2 per square feet higher than the present tax slab of panchayat and town panchayat. Industries and commercial properties in the six wards will pay 5 to 8 higher per square feet. The revision was proposed by a committee constituted by the local body with a deputy commissioner as a head on September 2022.
