Govt to suffer a loss of Rs 2200 crores by dropping LBT

Nagpur: As the Local Body Tax (LBT) is going to be abolished from the state of Maharashtra, the state government is likely to suffer a loss of Rs 22 crores on its revenue generation. As the loss is going to directly affect as many as 26 Municipal Corporations across the state, it is intended that the loss be recouped through the revenue generated by professional tax and hike in stamp duty tax.

When the Congress-Nationalist Congress Party government was ruling the state it was contemplating over the issue whether or not to abolish the LBT. But, when the Bhartiya Janata Party was facing elections, it attracted the business community saying that it would abolish LBT if came to power. Truly, having come to power, the BJP government is going to abolish LBT from coming August 1 from all 26 municipal corporations across the state, informed State Finance Minister Sudhir Mungantiwar, adding that the financial burden on each municipal corporation across the state would be compensated with 1% hike in stamp duty and diversion of professional tax to municipal corporations.

According to sources, the state government’s permission is being sought to make recoveries from those businessmen/ traders who are trying to evade payment of outstanding LBT dues against them. It is also learnt that the state government has announced ‘abhay yojana‘ but the said scheme is feared to be misused by the business community, causing heavy loss to the NMC.