SC accepts Trans Thane units' plea

The three-judge bench of the Supreme Court headed by Justice Ruma Pal on Monday admitted the special leave petition (SLP) filed by the industrial units in the Trans-Thane Creek (TTC) area against Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC).

The Small Scale Entrepreneurs' Association (SSEA) petition had challenged the authority of the NMMC to collect cess and property tax from the industrial units in the area.

But, the high court had dismissed the petition on grounds that in a similar case pertaining to the Jalgaon MIDC area, the Aurangabad bench of the court had asked the petitioner to approach the lower court.

The apex court directed that notices would be issued to the parties in question; the matter is set to come up in three weeks. This must have as something to cheer about for the units after they were dealt with a rude blow as the HC had dismissed their writ petition in January.

The apex court has said that it will also issue notices to other parties in the case "" the Maharashtra government and Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC). The HC had given the association an eight-week timeframe to approach the lower court, which ended in the last week of March.

Interestingly, before the timeframe ended, the civic body had issued a 48-hour notice to the units to pay property and cess taxes. Besides, to seize moveable assets, 'warrants of distress' were also learnt to have been issued against some units.

The NMMC and TTC industrial units have been at loggerheads for some years now over the property tax issue. While TTC claims that the units are part of MIDC area and do not come under the jurisdiction of the civic body, NMMC claims that since the entire MIDC area falls in its jurisdiction, the units are liable to pay local taxes levied by it.

The industrial units maintain that not even a small part of the revenue that the municipal corporation has been collecting from them by means of property tax is used for the maintenance or development of the industrial area's infrastructure.

There are more than 3,500 large, medium and small industries in the TTC area, along Thane-Belapur road. SSEA represents 1,600 units.

The units had waited for more than four years for the verdict of the HC, whose dismissal was a huge disappointment for them.

However, with the SC's admission on Monday and the state government having cleared the decks for declaring the area an autonomous industrial township, as provided in the constitution, entrepreneurs now can see some light at the end of the tunnel.