No waiver of property tax for 60 private edu institutions: HC

tnn | Nov 22, 2017, 00:32 IST

 

Madurai: The Madurai bench of the Madras high court on Tuesday refused to quash notices issued by the Madurai Corporation to about 60 private educational institutions demanding about Rs 20.85 crore property tax from them.

Justice R Mahadevan heard the pleas of the concerned educational institutions including St John's Matriculation Higher Secondary School, Kochadai, Madurai, filed against corporation notices. Madurai Corporation's counsel R Murali submitted that to avail exemption from payment of property tax, educational institutions, as per the Madurai City Municipal Corporation Act, should satisfy two conditions - running the institution on purely philanthropic line and the corporation council's resolution approving the institution. Accepting the submission, the court said that schools are entitled to claim exemption from payment of property tax only in the event of approval of it by the corporation council.

The judge further said, "The petitioners - schools are not purely philanthropic institutions and it is also not the case of the petitioners that they are running the schools without receiving any fees or running the schools totally free to all the students. Thus, people seeking exemption should satisfy the condition."

Accordingly, the judge disposed of the petitions by giving them liberty to approach the corporation within two weeks from the receipt of court order copy to seek approval of the corporation council. In the event of approval, the petitioners are entitled for exemption. Otherwise, it is for the corporation to take appropriate action to see that the property tax is collected from them without further delay, the judge said.

Last year, the deputy revenue officer of the corporation issued notices to the schools, after which the commissioner issued a final attachment notice stating that the amount should be paid within a certain period. If they fail, the movable properties would be seized from the schools and auctioned.

The corporation on April 8 last year issued notice demanding Rs 75.73 lakh from St John's Matriculation school as property tax for the years 2008-09 to 2015-16.

The schools claimed that no property tax was levied all these years, until the impugned notice issued. When the school buildings are for educational purposes and the building wholly belonged to the schools, there could not be any assessment, they claimed. But, the corporation said that the petitioners which are all private institutions impart education in a professional manner by collecting fees under various heads and therefore they could not claim that they are purely philanthropic.

CM issues appointment orders to 500 doctors

TNN | Nov 22, 2017, 00:18 IST

 

Chennai: Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami on Tuesday handed over appointment orders to 556 doctors at a function held in the city. The doctors will be posted in vacant posts in various state-run hospitals, he said.

With this, nearly 96% of all posts in the government medical colleges, hospitals and primary health centres have been filled, Palaniswami said. "The remaining 4% of the seats will be filled up soon," he added. Appointment orders were also given to 175 junior assistants and 49 typists and seven others for taking notes in short-hand, who were appointed through the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission.

This year, the state has appointed 721 specialists and 1,229 doctors to various posts, taking the total number of recruitments from the Tamil Nadu Medical Service Recruitment Board to 10,858 since 2012, the chief minister said. He urged doctors, nurses and paramedical staff to serve the poor who visit government hospitals. Health minister C Vijayabaskar and senior health officials including health secretary J Radhakrishnan were present at the event.

Got details of 70 shell firms of Sasi kin: I-T

B Sivakumar | TNN | Updated: Nov 22, 2017, 05:40 IST

 

 

 

Copies of incriminating documents were seized from Poes Garden, officers said.

 

CHENNAI: Senior income tax officials in Chennai said they have unearthed 70 shell companies which they believed were set up by convicted AIADMK leader V K Sasikala, her family members and associates. The claim comes after searches at Veda Nilayam, the Poes Garden residence of former CM J Jayalalithaa. Earlier searches were conducted at 188 places.

Two officials, who did not want to be named, said they would decide on questioning Sasikala in the Bengaluru prison, after sifting through the seized documents. One of them said several bank accounts and lockers were frozen. Officials are perusing files including some stored in pen drives and laptops seized from various places. Hard and soft copies of many incriminating documents were seized from the rooms used by Sasikala and S Poongundran in Jayalalithaa's Poes Garden residence, said another official. Poongundran was Jayalalithaa's personal assistant.

Rajarajan, son-in-law of Ilavarasi - Sasikala's sister-in-law and co-convict in the wealth case - provided keys of the Veda Nilayam rooms, said officials.The department had pressed into service 1,800 officials for the search operation that lasted for a week. Apart from the documents seized at Poes Garden, the officials had seized Rs 7.14 crore cash, Rs 5 crore worth jewellery and documents relating to investment of Rs 1,430 crore worth unaccounted income."Much of the details about shell companies were found in pen-drives and computers. We will probe the source of funds for all the transactions. We are also probing whether investments were done in other countries," said the official.

The department will open the sealed bank lockers during the investigation, he said.The department apart from getting information from various sources about the business activities of Sasikala and family also made use its own wing. "We involved the Regional Economic Intelligence Council to watch the activities of the business and also provide information and documents. Only after collating all these information, we went on a massive search," said the official.

The department is likely to invoke Benami Transactions (Prohibition) Act, 1988 against some of the property owners. "The process of identifying the benamis has started. Earlier, most of the benamis used to be people working in the family. But now a days, benamis are mostly rank outsiders," said a senior official.

A year on, ‘junked’ notes continue to flow into temple hundis in Tamil Nadu 

Ram Sundaram | TNN | Updated: Nov 22, 2017, 05:53 IST



CHENNAI: With a prayer on their lips, temple administrators are continuing to count and store demonetised currencies that are still flowing into hundials in temples across the state. It was Rs 10 crore at the last count, say temples under the state Hindu Religious & Charitable Endowments (HR&CE) department.

Even a year after demonetisation, temples in Tamil Nadu are receiving Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 rupee currency notes as donations in their 'hundials' or donation boxes. Temples administered by the state HR&CE department say they received at least Rs 10 crore rupees as donations after the December 31 deadline set by the Centre to exchange old currency notes for new ones.

With the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) turning down a proposal from HR&CE to accept demonetised currency notes after the said deadline, old notes are now being stored as 'junk' in temples.

HR&CE authorities are uncertain about this claim as no centralised attempts were taken post-demonetisation to find out how much is being stored in temples and who deposited them.

According to government records, there are 38,600 Hindu religious institutions under the control of the HR&CE. Of this, nearly 90% with an annual income of less than Rs 10,000 are classified as 'non-listed' institutions and the remaining 4,500 are classified as 'listed' institutions.

Apart from grants from both the governments, donations through donation boxes act as a major source of income for these temples located across the state. Currency notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 denominations were declared invalid on November 8, 2016. Since cash deposited in temple donation boxes did not come under tax scanner, bundles of demonetised currency notes found its way to these boxes."Income of these temples witnessed a sharp rise during this period and concerned authorities stood in queues outside banks to exchange these notes till the very last minute on December 31," said a HR&CE official.

However, old notes kept flowing into donation boxes even after this deadline and even a year later, particularly in listed temples (under Section 46 III with an annual income of more than Rs 10 lakh).

"Temples like Meenakshi Amman Temple in Madurai and Patteswarar temple in Perur, Coimbatore received more than 50,000 as old notes. A few amman temples such as Samayapuram Mariamman temple in Trichy also received more or less the same amount in old currency notes," said an HR&CE joint commissioner.

Sources said that a few temples had approached HR&CE seeking directions on what to do with these notes. Not in a position to decide anything on this matter, HR&CE authorities wrote to RBI requesting them to accept old notes from temples administered directly by them, sources added. However, RBI refused to relax norms.

Following this, temples are storing these notes in their respective safety lockers just like any other property.

TN woman held for FB post against judge

TNN | Updated: Nov 22, 2017, 05:44 IST

 

 

VELLORE: Police on Tuesday arrested a 40-year-old woman from Vellore for a 'derogatory' Facebook post against a Madras HC judge. Police were not clear if the woman had posted or shared the message, but Vellore SP P Pakalavan told TOI that the offence was the same in either case.

The message on the FB page of S Mahalakshmi, a homemaker from Sathuvachari, on September 14, questioned Justice Kirubakaran's remarks against teachers staging protests and strikes. The judge had, in an order on a teachers' protest in September, said such boycotts and strikes were a primary reason for government school students scoring low marks in NEET.

The post that appeared on Mahalakshmi's FB page said the protest called by 96 associations under the 'Jacto Jio' banner included not just teachers, but also other professionals, including court staff, block development officers, noon meal staff, tahsildars and professors. Attributing motives, she said the judge was harsh only on teachers. Earlier, at least 10 people, most of them Jacto Jio members, who posted messages against the judge on social media were arrested.

Saveetha University founders’ Day

TNN | Nov 22, 2017, 00:15 IST

 

Chennai: To mark its 30th anniversary, Saveetha University celebrated Founder's Day on Tuesday. More than 500 awards were given, in addition to cash prizes and scholarships worth more than Rs 1.35 crore, said a statement from the private university. Students and faculty members received awards for their presentations and publications, the release said.

In reply to RTI, residents near airport told not to ask ‘questions’

Shruti Suresh | TNN | Nov 22, 2017, 06:20 IST

 

CHENNAI: Anxious residents trying to get details of land acquisition for airport expansion are being made to run from pillar to post as the information sought by them through Right to Information (RTI) has either been redirected to other bodies or denied under the RTI Act, 2005.

Plots of land have been recognised at Kolapakkam, Manapakkam, Pallavaram Cantonment, Pozhichalur, Pammal and CowlBazaar for airport expansion but notification details except for Kolapakkam and Manpakkam are not available for public use.

"Residents are spending sleepless nights for not knowing if their land and property would be acquired. Federation of Pozhichalur Welfare Association had sent RTI appeal to various addressees - Kancheepuram collector, airport director, DGCA, state chief secretary among others — seeking information on the proposed land acquisition for the Chennai airport surrounding Pozhichalur and Cowl Bazaar. But we have not got replies from even a single body," said T Ravindranathan, a resident of Pozhichalur.

While the state government directed the RTI query to the transport department, the reply from the latter stated that information would not be provided under section 2(f) of the RTI Act, 2005. According to the act, a PIO is expected to provide 'information' as definedunder section 2(f) of the RTI Act and not answer questions of the applicant.

The RTI request to Airports Authority of India directed the residents to seek a response from the special district revenue officer (land acquisition) of Chennai Airport Expansion Scheme in Sriperumbudur.

"Instead of themselves redirecting theRTI query to the concerned body, they are sending an RTI reply to us to direct the query," added Ravindranthan.

"Instead of working for the public, the government is making lives difficult for the common man. We have lived in this area for years and suddenly we know that it has been earmarked for airport expansion. But the government does not want to directly answer our queries or allay our fears regarding our property," said Suresh of State Bank colony.

RTI activist Siva Elango said questions like "What is the deadline set for the project?" or "How much money has been allocated?" will inevitably be asked followed by question marks.