KATHMANDU, AUGUST 25
Kathmandu Metropolitan City has started taking out musical concerts door-todoor in a bid to exert moral pressure on big ta payers inside the metropolis for timely payment of property tax.
Today, a team of women artists of a musical band took to the street playing the traditional panchay baja and singing to draw the attention of tax payers in New Road, Khusibu, Naya Bazaar, and Soaltee Mode, among other places. The metropolitan city started this initiative to encourage locals to pay their property tax pending for the last three to 28 years.
The KMC charges 0.01 per cent of the government's evaluation of property, which is one of the lowest among other local governments inside the valley. Despite this, KMC has been struggling to collect property tax from large business complexes as property tax has been a more troublesome issue for large property holders than those who operate small businesses.
KMC has already made public 70 large business houses that have defaulted on property tax. Only the proprietors of two buildings that house Suraj Arcade, a business complex and Hotel Vaishali have paid up. "As we got tired of taxpayers' neglect, we decided to ask an all ladies' band to exert moral pressure on them," said Shiva Raj Adhikari chief of KMC Revenue Department.
The band reached the houses of people who had not paid the tax and sang a song that urged them to abide by the citizens' role to compulsory pay property tax on time.
Today, the KMC made public the names of seven large property owners who did not pay tax despite repeated requests from the local government. The property owners made public today include Kantipur Hotel at Durbarmarg, Hotel Platinum at Soaltee Mode, White Field School at Khusibu, Ranjana Trade Centre at New Road, Kesa Properties at New Road, Sisu Aryal at Minbhawan and RB Complex at New Road. The local body has said that these business houses were yet to pay dues amounting to Rs 65 million to the government.
The KMC has warned it will be forced to take various actions against those who continue to turn a deaf ear to its call. The local government can confiscate property documents and padlock the business or block the business account if they do not pay the tax on time.
A version of this article appears in the print on August 26 2021, of The Himalayan Times.
