Surat: Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC) has been so far unable to recover 90 per cent of pending property tax dues to the tune of Rs273 crore from over 2.58 lakh property owners in the city. SMC plans to take over open plots of people whose tax dues have been pending over for three years. Property tax recovery is likely to fall short of 90 per cent target this year too, sources said. Against this year’s demand of Rs1,234 crore, SMC officials have collected Rs970.78 crore in property tax till date. The total collection at the end of financial year 2017-18 was Rs851 crore as against tax demand of Rs1,019 crore.There are 18, 90,550 residential and other units in the city. Bankim Desai, deputy commissioner, finance, SMC, said, “Our recovery at present stands at 78.61 per cent and it will reach 85 per cent by this month-end. Around 2.58 lakh residential owners are yet to pay up their taxes this year, with 1.76 lakh having arrears of a couple of years.”Property tax is pending for long for 150 commercial and open plots and 58,000 residential plots. “We have been regularly sealing properties whose owners fail to pay up taxes. We will now start severing water and drainage connections. We will start taking harsher steps to recover tax dues from a defaulter,” Desai said.Municipal commissioner M Thennarasan said, “We have the option of attaching the property of a person, who fails to pay up tax for a few years. We are taking legal recourse to enter SMC’s name in the property document of such a person before auctioning it for recovery of tax dues. However, auction has not worked in the past. We are focused on collecting tax from properties that are occupied for now. Vacant and open plots would be attached to recover tax dues.”

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