Cuttack, Aug. 12: Orissa High Court today imposed restrictions on the revision of holding tax by the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC).
The court issued the interim stay order on a petition challenging the legality of a notification that sought to make a fresh assessment and collect taxes from the houses and buildings within BMC limits. The BMC commissioner had issued the notification on December 15, 2010, by exercising powers under the Orissa Municipal Corporation Act, 2003.
Confederation of Citizens of Association (Bhubaneswar) general secretary Subhransu Rath and former MP Mira Das had filed the petition seeking quashing of the notification.
After the formation of the corporation, the civic authorities were to collect property tax. But the BMC authorities are still collecting holding tax following the Orissa Municipal Act, 1950, under the supplementary and transitional provision of Section 693 (3) of the Orissa Municipal Corporation Act, 2003, as the legislation for the new tax regime is yet to be introduced.
“The BMC is bereft of any power and authority to issue notifications under the Orissa Municipal Corporation Act, 2003, to levy and collect the property tax from owners in the absence of a legislation,” the petition contended.
“The two-judge bench of Chief Justice V.Gopala Gowda and Justice B.N. Mohapatra today granted a stay on the revision of holding tax within the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation area,” petitioners’ counsel Pitambar Acharya told The Telegraph.
The Orissa Municipal Corporation Act, 2003, postulates a comprehensive procedure like setting up of a Corporation Valuation (CVC) for assessment and revision of tax subject to the decision of the Corporation Appellate Tribunal (CAT). “Our basic contention before the court was that though the Orissa Municipal Corporation Act was enacted in 2003, neither the CVC nor the CAT has been constituted for the assessment of tax. Without doing so, BMC had come out with a notification for revision of the holding tax on the principle enumerated in the Orissa Municipal Act, 1950, which had since been repealed,” Acharya said.
