Belagavi: The govt is stepping up efforts to widen its tax net by focusing on IT parks, tech firms, and commercial establishments operating under gram panchayat limits in Bengaluru Urban district.
Rural development and panchayat raj (RDPR) department has initiated a manual property survey across the state, and has identified 1.4 crore properties so far, including 8 lakh under 32 gram panchayats in Bengaluru Urban, that have evaded tax.
Acknowledging tax irregularities among IT parks and software firms, RDPR minister Priyank Kharge told the legislative council, "The state govt is aggressively working to bring all of them into the tax net and recover dues."
Responding to a question from Ravi Kumar of BJP, Priyank admitted, "There is no question of ignoring such revenue. We have been issuing point-of-sale (PoS) machines to revenue collectors to generate bills and recover dues."
Kumar had earlier highlighted discrepancies in the tax collection process, pointing out that many properties remain outside the tax net. "The govt maintains there are only 8 lakh properties in Bengaluru Urban, but an independent survey by an NGO has found 5.2 lakh more properties," he said.
He accused companies of exploiting gram panchayat jurisdictions to avoid higher urban taxes. "A prominent software MNC on Sarjapur Road pays only Rs 18 crore to a panchayat when the actual tax is over Rs 50 crore. These discrepancies arise due to a nexus between revenue collectors and property owners," Kumar said.
Priyank conceded that tax evasion is an issue but highlighted significant progress. "During 2024, we recovered 52% of tax dues amounting to nearly Rs 3,000 crore—the highest collection so far. We coordinated with the revenue department during the manual survey for better efficiency," he said.
Kumar urged the govt to expedite efforts to bring more properties under the tax net. "Nobody would believe Karnataka has only 1.4 crore rural properties. Every village now has concrete buildings, and even a modest tax of Rs 500 per property would generate substantial revenue to fund govt guarantee schemes and developmental works," he said.