AHMEDABAD: Picture waking up to a hefty property tax bill from the civic body, demanding payment for something you believed was settled long ago. This is the alarming reality for numerous residents in Ahmedabad, entangled in a “property tax scam.”
This scam, affecting all city zones but particularly impacting the West Zone, has left over 1,000 property owners—who had settled their dues—receiving alarming bills from the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC), some amounting to lakhs of rupees. This issue has been concealed for nearly five years.
A senior AMC official suspects a group of touts or agents, who assisted citizens in dealing with AMC’s property tax department five years ago, to be behind this scam. “These agents allegedly misused the login credentials of an employee from AMC’s West Zone. They are believed to have collected cash from property owners, falsely claiming to settle their outstanding dues. Instead, they pocketed the cash and manipulated the system to show ‘zero outstanding dues’ for various properties,” revealed a knowledgeable AMC official.
The e-governance department’s investigation uncovered this manipulation. AMC’s system recalculated the dues, revealing that the previously cleared bills had been misclassified as unpaid. Currently, the scam’s estimated value ranges between Rs 1.5 crore and Rs 2 crore.
One case in Khadia involved a family of five small shop owners who received new bills for 2025-26 indicating total dues of Rs 1.59 lakh, despite previous receipts showing “zero” dues. “The scam has affected dues dating back to as early as 2017–18. The outstanding amounts per property range from Rs 21,000 to Rs 46,000,” said a family member, who wished to remain anonymous. They promptly reported the issue to AMC’s tax department.
Another AMC official, who preferred to remain unidentified, informed TOI, “The manipulation involved using credit and debit cards to create a facade of payment. Only those with card receipts have been refunded, while cash payers without receipts are being asked to pay again,” revealed the official.
Despite the extent of the scam, AMC has not yet taken significant action. Repeated requests for information over the past week from property tax and e-governance officials have yielded no concrete data on the recovery of outstanding dues. “The actual number of citizens impacted by this scam is still unknown. All zones are affected, with the West Zone showing the most irregularities, yet no disciplinary measures have been enacted against involved personnel,” added the AMC official.
