Portal pangs: Property owners in urban Haryana belts paid undue development charges

Hundreds of property owners in urban areas of Haryana were subjected to “unnecessary harassment” after they were forced to pay “development charges” which they had already paid, according to official records.

At the root of this glitch was the portal that deals with property tax dues payment and no dues certificate (NDC) management system of the Urban Local Bodies (ULB). What also complicated the administrative oversight was lackadaisical functioning of municipalities which had updated dues on the portal in November and December 2022, but the development charges “were not updated properly.”

Top government sources say the mandarins of chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar’s secretariat were in a tizzy when it emerged that the affected property owners, who deposited development charges to get no dues certificate (NDC) needed to sell property, were owners of properties in areas where developmental charges at present are not applicable.

The Section 96-A of the Haryana Municipal Corporation Act, 1994 and Section 99-A of the Haryana Municipal Act, 1973 makes issuance of ‘No Dues Certificate’ mandatory. It says: “A document in respect of sale, transfer, lease, gift...of any lands or buildings situated in a municipal area which is required to be registered...shall not be registered unless accompanied with a no dues certificate issued by the Commissioner...certifying that all municipal dues including rents, taxes, charges in respect of such lands or buildings as mentioned in the document...have been fully paid.”

As per file notings (HT has all relevant copies) of the issue, development charges are not applicable in areas of Haryana Shehri Vikas Pradhikaran (HSVP), Haryana State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation (HSIIDC), planned/licensed colonies, properties where change of Land Use (CLU) has been issued, lal-dora residential properties and agriculture properties.

Sources say during a meeting held to revamp the portal dealing with property IDs, chief principal secretary (CPS to CM) Rajesh Khullar, stumbled upon this glaring glitch. The matter was brought to the notice of chief minister and corrective steps were taken to contain the further damage.

As per official records, two month long administrative exercise to make amends and refund the development charges amount began on September 6 when the ULB mooted the proposal entitled ‘updating data on NDC for agriculture properties and development charges.’

“During the Parliamentary constituency meetings and various meetings under the chairmanship of..., a lot of irregularities have been highlighted with respect to updating the development charges on the NDC portal against many property IDs,” the ULB stated in its proposal approved by a battery of senior officers and endorsed by ULB minister Dr Kamal Gupta.

During the back -and -forth movement of the file the issue was taken up with chief minister Khattar, who gave nod to refund the amount and other proposals of the ULB on this issue.

Meanwhile, the government on Saturday said the ULB department has identified 1,588 properties where owners have paid development charges in HSVP, HSIIDC, licensed colonies, CLU acquired properties, Lal Dora residential properties, and agricultural properties.

“The department has decided to refund the amount of development charges deposited by such property owners to the tune of ₹5. 19 crore. SMS notifications have also been sent to the property owners, informing them that they can reclaim the amount of development charges paid by applying on the NDC portal according to the prescribed provisions,” a government spokesperson said in a statement.

Municipalities in mess

In its report to the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO), the ULB department said the dues on the portal were updated by all the municipalities in November and December 2022, but the development charges were not updated properly.

As per file notings, development charges are to be levied based on prevailing collector rates on properties situated in relevant areas. “Since, the collector rates gets revised periodically, the development charges must also be revised based on the revised collector rates and it has been observed that the development charges are not updated periodically by the municipalities,” ULB department has said.

The department informed the CMO that “a lot of property owners have paid the development charges” either offline or online, but the municipalities have not even updated the dues against the properties wherein the dues are already paid.

“This forces the property owners to raise objections for updating of dues resulting in unnecessary harassment of the property owners...,” reads the proposal.

The ULB department also sought nod from the CMO to direct them that the properties where the development charges have been paid by the property owners must be updated by the respective municipality within three months using their admn/checker user IDs and that property owners should not be forced to raise objections.

The director of ULB, Dr Yash Pal submitted the proposal with some changes on September 26

on the basis of “feedback and extensive consultation” to sort out the issues related to development charges. He sought in principle approval from the CMO to issue Standard operating Procedure (SoP).

“The department has identified 1,463 properties amounting to ₹4.34 crore where the property owners have already paid their dues with regard to development charges before the dues were updated from the backend. Therefore, the refund of the development charges needs to be processed in these cases. An online mechanism will be developed on the portal itself for processing of these refunds,” wrote director ULB Dr Yash Pal after which Cabinet minister Dr Kamal Gupta submitted the file to CM on September 29.

The issue reached finality on October 11 and in a hand-written note, Principal Secretary (to CM) V Umashankar wrote “CM has approved the proposals...”

Two days later “after the approval of the CM”, ULB minister Dr Gupta returned the file for “further necessary action”.