GI survey complete in city

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, April 25

The Geographical Information Survey for the proposed smart city of Jalandhar is finally over.

The Municipal Corporation of Jalandhar (MCJ) has now begun to map the properties to assess the number of tax payers in the city.

According to Joginder Singh, Executive Engineer, satellite images of the city had been procured and were being checked for their correctness. Also, the civic body is in the process to collect all secondary available data and its availability.

As many as 2.91 lakh properties, including 1.89 lakh residential ones, were identified in the survey. These also include 58,709 open spaces, 1,296 religious spaces and 9,912 properties given on rent.

“To begin with, we have started mapping the area falling in Sector 10, which majorly includes the Model Town area. In the process, we will also identify the properties below 5 marlas as even though the residential properties are not taxable, the commercial ones are liable to pay the property tax,” said Singh.

Interestingly, the city, known to be an NRI hub, was only found to have 390 properties registered on the name of NRIs. The details of over 24,734 properties could not be known as the doors were found to be “permanently closed” by the survey teams.

Joginder Singh further said that following this, the MCJ was planning a project management unit (PMU) which would initiate the GIS programme in the city.

“As proposed by the Municipal Commissioner, the PMU will act as a facilitator to run the project in its initial phase and later transfer it to the MC officials. Later, the civic body may route the registration of properties through the PMU. This will enable the GI software to add new properties automatically into its system,” said Singh.

The civic body has also asked its department of property tax and water supply to coordinate and identify the actual number of tax payers and defaulters in the city. The officials were also asked to recover the pending arrears on an urgent basis.