Amid vehement protest by the opposition parties, the Ongole Municipal Corporation(OMC) gave its nod for the proposed property tax revision and collection of garbage tax.
Gangada Sujatha, the maiden Mayor of Ongole, on Wednesday announced that the Council had approved 24 subjects slated for discussion even as six TDP and one Jana Sena Party Corporator staged a protest in front the podium. In the 50-member House, the ruling YSR Congress party has a strength of 42 corporators.
Unruly scenes were witnessed as the ruling and opposition party members jostled against each other and raised slogans for and against the proposed tax reforms mooted by the State government at the behest of the Union government.
Earlier, Independent member Chintapalli Gopichand urged the Mayor to defer collection of the garbage tax for now taking into consideration the impact of the pandemic on people.
JSP activists, led by its Prakasam district In-charge M. Kalyan, laid a siege to the OMC guarded by a posse of police. Activists of the Left parties, including Communist Party of India(CPI), CPI(Marxist), CPI(ML), CPI(ML) New Democracy, also picketed the OMC during a protest organised by the Ongole Town Development president Marella Subba Rao.
In Nellore, CPI(M) State Secretariat member Ch. Babu Rao led a protest by the Simhapuri Pattana Samakhya before the Nellore Municipal Corporation office against the civic tax proposals.
“The ruling YSRCP has no right to impose taxes without an elected civic body in Nellore,” he maintained before the Samakhya members set ablaze the copies of the tax proposals.
