Edu institutions top property tax defaulters list

- Minor panchayats face fund crunch
- Educational institutions owe Rs 60 crore

Kakinada: Education Institutions top property tax defaulters list. The top three defaulters are private schools, which produced toppers and
State rankers . The minor panchayats in the district have been facing severe fund crunch to meet their daily expenses because of non-
payment of property tax by corporate educational institutions.

The minor panchayats were not even in a position to clear power bills to meet the drinking water needs.

Out of 1,058 panchayats in the district, 529 are minor panchayats. More than 450 corporate institutions out of 850 are located in rural
and semi urban areas. Out of total arrears worth Rs 132 crore, the corporate educational bodies owe minor panchayats more than Rs 60
crore .

There are many engineering, pharmacy and MBA colleges located in the neighbouring Tallarevu mandal, Peddapuram, Rangampeta
mandals. Owners of these institutions prefer rural areas to build spacious premises and to avail the benefits of property tax. Non-payment
of property tax by these institutes for years, lack of sufficient knowledge on part of panchayats’ on income sources, political influence and
vested interests of some panchayat officials are the reasons behind this crisis.

Aditya Group of Institutions at Surampalem belongs to former MLA and MLC N Sasha Reddy. Chaitanya Institute of Science and
Technology at Madhavapatnam belongs to former MLC K V V Satyanarayana Raju. These political leaders have been avoiding paying
property tax payment from the past one-and-a-half decade.

Former Sarpanch of Vakalapudi and former vice-president of Andhra Pradesh Sarpanch Association Ginjala Srinivasa Rao said that the
panchayats could impose 13 to 40 per cent property tax on the total cost of construction of educational institutions under commercial
category. The panchayats opted for reasonable tax by passing resolutions in respective panchayat bodies. Despite corporate institutions
opting for revision of the existing Act and even after approaching courts, there was no change.

Madhavapatnam panchayat sources said that the chairman of an engineering college, who owns a number of educational institutions in
East and West Godavari districts and Visakhapatnam, paid Rs 4 lakh dues to panchayat after the issue had been brought to the notice of
the Election Commission during the MLC polls in 2015. District Panchayat officer A V V S Sharma also confirmed this fact.

Anjaneyulu L