Ahmedabad citizens find betterment charge taxing

Pradip Patel, resident of India Colony, had purchased a house 27 years ago for Rs60,000. Now, he has to pay Rs1 lakh to Ahmedabad Urban Development Authority (AUDA) towards betterment tax.

Similarly, Vasant Bhatt, resident of Abhishek Society, will have to pay Rs1.50 lakh under the same head for the property he purchased for same amount in 1991.  

Thousands of Bopalites will have to pay hefty amounts towards betterment tax to AUDA. The authorities have served betterment charge demand notices to more than 1,000 residential societies. As per estimates, betterment charge demand amounts to around Rs200 crore in Bopal.  

The residents of Bopal believe that the betterment charges cannot be justified in the sense that development has taken place after obtaining due permission from the concerned authority.

Vasant Bhatt said that the charges are too high for a middle income family to pay. “We have lived for these many years without any basic amenities but still paid taxes regularly. Now, they want us to pay hefty amount for providing amenities, which cannot be justified,” he said.  

“Residents have been paying all taxes including revenue, water and sanitation taxes among others to the government for years, which are supposed to be used for development of the area. The government owes around Rs150 crore to Rs200 crore to the Bopal Gram Panchayat,” said Pradip Patel, president of Bopal Vikas Parishad.

He believes that if the government uses this money for development of Bopal, there is no need for levying any betterment tax on citizens. Moreover, the government needs to use half of the accruals of selling government grazing land (Gauchar) for providing various amenities in the area.

“I don’t know the figure of betterment tax to be recovered from residents of Bopal. However, whatever has been done is as per the rules,” said Dharmendra Shah, AUDA chairman.