The CPI(M) has found fault with the Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation (GVMC) officials for failing to provide adequate facilities at the field-level to enable citizens to lodge their ‘objections’ against the proposed property tax hike, based on capital value.
In a statement here on Thursday, CPI(M) city secretary B. Ganga Rao, who is the corporator from Ward 78, in the GVMC, said that the draft notification on property tax, for calculation of tax based on capital value, was issued on June 3. Though citizens were asked to submit their objections against the proposed tax, they were not given an e-mail or online facility for registering their objections, despite the pandemic threat.
There was no provision to hand over the ‘objection letter’ at the ward secretariats. The non-provision of an opportunity to citizens to submit their grievances on the proposed property tax at the field level is against the law, he said, adding that the objection letters submitted to citizens, various associations, unions and organisations were not being acknowledged at the ‘Tappal Section’ at the main office. He also alleged that the staff of the Tappal Section were passing the buck, saying that the Commissioner had asked them not to give acknowledgments.
He sought that information on the objection letters, receiving on each day, should be displayed at the office. In the absence of such information, citizens were wondering whether the letters would be considered at all. He demanded that acknowledgements should be given to the citizens.
