The Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) has decided to stop mutation of illegal properties. But the civic body will make the owner of the property a “person liable to pay tax.”
KMC officials said it will become difficult to sell a property without mutation and this move is being devised as a deterrent against illegal construction.
Some officials, however, said most people who bought such properties did so with the full knowledge.
The move is part of a series of steps being taken by the civic body after the collapse of an allegedly illegal under-construction building in Garden Reach last month. Thirteen people were killed in the collapse.
The collapse highlighted the failure of the civic body to act against illegal construction, which has mushroomed across the city.
“Earlier we used to do the mutation of a property in the name of the owner even if the property was illegal. But we will stop this practice,” a senior official said on Friday.
“We will collect tax from the owners of such illegal properties and call them person liable to pay tax,” said the official.
The Telegraph reported on Thursday that the KMC has made it mandatory for officials assessing tax dues of a property to check its building plan.
The decision to examine approved building plans comes after the Calcutta High Court questioned how the two departments of the same organisation — assessment (property tax) and building — did not know what the other was doing.
Structures that are built without an approved plan or have deviated from the plan would still be charged property tax. The assessment (property tax) department has to inform the building department about the deviation.
KMC officials said people who are buying any property should also visit the KMC
website and check the assessment register by entering the assessee number of the property.
“We will start writing in the assessment register that the property has not undergone a mutation. The register will mention that this was done because the property is not legal and did not have a valid permit from the civic body,” said the official.