The Orange city is seeing Red!! Devendra Fadnavis hails from Nagpur. It was expected from the Chief
Minister to not only concentrate on Vidharbha, but also at the same
time to clear backlog, promote development so that even Nagpur can come
in terms with what today Mumbai, Pune and Nashik are! But it seems a far
fetched dream for a Nagpurkar. On my last visit to Nagpur again in
January, I have learnt that it is NOW practically impossible for “businessmen” and landlords to survive in the Orange city.
To illustrate, say you have a property in Nagpur that is rented out and
fetches you a rent of Rs. 10,000/- pm, that makes it to Rs. 1,20,000/-
annually. Believe me or not, every landlord will stand when I put this
down…The amount of property tax collected turns out to be Rs. 97,200/-
annually i.e. if you do not have water connection for this rented
premises from the Nagpur Corporation. If you have water connection from
the NMC, the taxes annually turn out to be Rs. 65,000/. As per law,
taxes are to be borne by the landlord. So tenants nowadays don’t enter
into agreement and prefer “cheating” the government. They enter into
revenue sharing model. But that’s uncalled for. Now after the landlord
is freed from paying this property tax, there are VAT and Service Tax
sleuths knocking your doors. Thus many businesses are closing. It is
impossible for business houses to run smooth operations. Huge retail
shops on the main roads in prime location are easily available on
rentals. Landlords and retailers are victimized. This is just against
development. Other cities like Mumbai property taxes are about 80%
lesser than Nagpur. Forget farmers, now in some days businessmen will
start committing suicides. Shyam Wardhane then municipal commissioner
did nothing for this…
(Published-18th Jan. 2015)
