Composite Area Linked System For Property Tax Reform In India

In India, property tax is presently levied on the basis of the rent†based rateable valuation system. Various official Commissions and Committees and professional experts have, over the last four decades, commented upon the inadequacies of this system, which, among other things, are the absence of an open market in land and rental transactions, the non†availablility of professionally trained valuers and the subjective nature of assessments in a corruption†prone administrative environment. As to the direction of future reforms, there have been two schools of thought †one, advocating for amendment of current rent control laws; and the other, favoring a new system of local taxation, delinked both from the capital value and rental value systems which are difficult to administer in India. This paper highlights the findings of a policy†oriented research study commissioned by the Ministry of Urban Development for the design and evaluation of such a system.