MC announces house tax waiver scheme, offers relief to residents

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, February 24

The AAP-led Municipal Corporation of Delhi on Monday announced house tax waiver scheme. Under the scheme, owners who will clear their 2024-25 dues will have all previous pending taxes waived off.

The scheme is expected to be passed in the MCD House on February 25.

Senior AAP leader and Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh, along with Mayor Mahesh Kumar Khichi, leader of the house Mukesh Goel and MCD in-charge Durgesh Pathak, announced the scheme.

“This is a major announcement. After paying the house tax for 2024-25, all previous outstanding dues will be written off,” Singh said.

“Houses within 100 and 500 square yards will now have their house tax cut by 50 per cent,” he said.

Under the new scheme, homeowners, who clear their full house tax for 2024-25 within the stipulated period, will have all their previous dues waived. From financial year 2025-26, house tax on properties up to 100 square yards will be fully waived. Additionally, properties ranging from 100 to 500 square yards will receive a 50 per cent reduction in house tax.

“Properties under 100 square yards will be fully exempt from house tax,” the AAP leader said.

Singh also announced tax relief for residential properties where commercial activities are conducted.

“Shops and commercial establishments in residential areas will also have their house tax completely waived,” he said.

Moreover, for the first time, 1,300 housing societies in Delhi, which were previously ineligible for any house tax exemptions, will receive a 25 per cent rebate, Singh added.

Pathak said: “MC employees never used to receive their salaries on time, with the last timely payment dating back to 2008-2009. Now, as the financial condition of the MC has improved, the employees receive their salaries on the first of every month.”

He alleged that several people have outstanding house tax dues and were being blackmailed by officials. “These officials harass them and demand money. As a result, the funds that should go into the MC’s account are instead lost to corruption,” he said.

Mayor Khichi announced that the AAP was working to regularise 12,000 employees, building on the 8,000 already regularised in the past two years. “We have already regularised 8,000 employees — 4,500 of them from the sanitation department, while the rest belong to various other departments,” the Mayor said.