BJP govt exploiting city: Aaditya on BMC decision to levy tax on shops in slums

Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Aaditya Thackeray on Tuesday accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government of exploiting Mumbai over the civic body`s decision to levy property tax on commercial establishments operating from slum areas, and collect solid waste management user charges, news agency PTI reported.

Addressing a press conference, he said Mumbaikars have to bear dug-up roads, non-operational buses of the Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) and contaminated water, but the BJP government does not have an answer to these issues.

The Mumbai civic body on Tuesday presented a Rs 74,427.41-crore budget, its biggest-ever, for financial year 2025-26 without any hike in taxes. No hike has been proposed in property tax or water tax, but it has decided to levy property tax on commercial establishments operating from slum areas from financial year 2025-26, which is expected to generate Rs 350 crore in additional revenue.

Thackeray said that in the past two years, the committed liability of BMC has reached Rs 2.5 lakh crore, PTI reported.

“The BJP is exploiting Mumbai,” the former minister alleged, adding, “It is shocking that the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has proposed property tax on small shops in slums.”

Thackeray said when the undivided Shiv Sena controlled BMC, it waived tax on residences with an area of up to 500 square feet, PTI reported.

Though the BJP government is imposing property tax on shops in slum areas, in the coming years, it will also levy tax on slums, he claimed.

Those who are supposed to get houses from the Slum Rehabilitation Authority (SRA) are being levied tax, the Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) from Worli in the city said.

On solid waste management user charges, the former environment minister said that till 2017, BMC would pick up waste of 10,000 metric tonnes.

“Now, there will be a user fee. If this does not stop, then we will hit the streets,” he said.

Alleging that there was a scam in road concretisation work, he said the BMC Commissioner on Tuesday admitted that only 26 per cent of the roads in the city have been concretised. 

(With PTI inputs)