Come August 15, it will be simpler for citizens to pay their civic dues. A Telegraph picture

Come Independence Day, Calcuttans will not have to run from one civic office to another to deposit taxes or fees.

The Calcutta Municipal Corporation (CMC) will introduce a one-window system of depositing house tax, trade licence fee, registration fee for a birth certificate or the fee for a revenue-clearance certificate.

“We will introduce the system in all CMC offices across the city from August 15,” said mayor Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharyya.

“A citizen will have to approach a revenue counter anywhere in the city during office hours and pay the tax or the fee. He will immediately get a receipt. The sanction fee for a proposed building in Sinthee can be paid in a Jadavpur office,” said municipal commissioner Alapan Bandyopadhyay.

Tata Consultancy Services has developed the “one-window” software and the trial run is on.

The system is being introduced as part of the CMC’s Rs 100-crore e-governance programme, being funded by the British government’s department for international development.

The department has given Rs 212 crore to the civic body to take up a capacity-building programme.

The civic authorities collect Rs 1.7 crore daily from the 100-odd counters across the city. The counters are item-specific in most borough offices — for instance, a counter that collects property tax will not accept amusement tax.

“The new system is fool-proof and there is no chance of defalcation, like the one reported from the Gariahat treasury four years ago,” said chief civic finance and accounts officer Debotosh Dasgupta.