Over 4,500 fake trade licences, property tax receipts detected in Mangaluru civic body

MANGALURU: The Mangaluru City Corporation officials have uncovered over 4,500 fake property tax and trade licences and suspect the involvement of middlemen, brokers and agents. The racket is expected to have cost the civic body crores of rupees in revenue loss.

The racketeers have allegedly pocketed the trade licence renewal fee and the property taxes while issuing fake certificates. The issue came to light after fake certificates were found to have been issued to one Devang Patel and Balakrishna Suvarna.

An agent, identified as Prithviraj Shetty, had allegedly taken thousands of rupees from them and given them fake trade licence and property tax receipts. The fraud was detected when the Palike officials dup up records for the last 15 years of Devang Patel’s trade licence.

The corporation commissioner has now ordered review of all the trade licences issues as it is believed that the racket is widespread. A complaint has also been registered with the police.