MC to divide liquor vends in 3 categories for tax recovery

Ludhiana: For the recovery of pending property tax from liquor vends, civic authorities have decided to divide the liquor vends into three categories on the basis of area where vends are established. The MC has decided to fix the amount to be recovered from the owners of liquor vends. In a meeting, mayor Balkar Sandhu and the liquor contractors agreed to fix the amount.
There are around 400 liquor vends in the city, and officials are expecting to recover Rs1.25 crore from these vends. The liquor vends in posh areas will come under category A, and property tax from one liquor vend will be Rs60,000. Similarly, from category B and C, Rs40,000 and Rs25,000 property tax will be recovered by the civic authorities.
Confirming the same, mayor Balkar Sandhu said: “The aim is to generate revenue from liquor contractors who are not paying property tax to MC for a long time. Every year, liquor vend locations get changed and MC could not recover tax from them. Therefore, we have decided to fix the amount on the basis of locality.”
Notably, the matter of non-recovery of property tax from liquor vends was highlighted by Congress MLA Sanjay Talwar last year, when he had written a letter to mayor Sandhu on the issue. After his letter, officials started paying attention to this area and started collecting details about liquor vends. But recovery of dues is still pending because they took a long time to decide things.