Government bodies top KMC’s defaulter list

Several nationalised banks and Science City, the biggest science park in the metropolis, have also not cleared their dues that they owe to the KMC.

While, the Science City run by National Council of Science Museum has not cleared its dues of Rs 15 crore, the West Bengal State Electricity Board tops the list with an outstanding amount of Rs 18,69,14443.

State government agencies like Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority (KMDA), Kolkata Improvement Trust (KIT), Kolkata Police Jail, State transport department, State excise and West Bengal Small Industries Development Corporation have not paid tax to the civic body for several years.

The Public Works Department of the state government is the second biggest defaulter , followed by the Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority with an outstanding amount of Rs 14,63,2858.

The government-run hospitals are also not far behind. Be it the Calcutta Medical College and Hospitals or Nilratan Sarkar Medical College and Hospitals, none of the state-run hospitals have paid tax to the civic body.

The amount of money that is due from the state-run hospitals is Rs 10,96,50393. Kolkata Police is just a step behind the government hospitals with an outstanding amount of more than Rs 2 crore.

Several nationalised banks like Allahabad Bank, State Bank of India, Union Bank of India, Central Bank of India have inflated the list of defaulters.

Most of the housing premises used by the staff of SBI in the city have not paid tax at least for the past ten years. Similar is the case with UBI, Canara Bank and Allahabad Bank.

These banks have not paid any property tax for the past 10 years.

To collect tax from a private party, the KMC adopts the system of raiding by sending the revenue collection inspectors to the premises of the defaulters.

The civic-body is, however, not too sure if they will be able to use the same system to collect money from the concerned government agencies.