Around this time of the year when we celebrate Navratri, the festival that best represents women power, where we worship goddesses Durga, Laskhmi and Saraswati, the epitome of “Sthree Shakti”, Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has come up with an interesting initiative to empower women.
PMC is encouraging more women to buy property in their names by granting five percent concession in the property tax to women having properties registered in their names. With the property registered in a women’s name, the lady will have a sense of social security.
Pune resident, Lakshmi Mahadevan says, “This move is in the right direction in the sense that it recognizes women empowerment and encourages women owning property which in turn is towards better security for women.”
Generally, very few women think of buying their own property. With such a move, women will definitely think about investing in a property registered in their own name. Anjali Pendse, a clinical psychologist in Pune states that with reduction in property tax for women, impact on housing with property on the women’s name will be good. Men will definitely book or purchase property in the name of their mother, wife, or daughter to benefit from the property tax. Even going for second home or for sound investments, joint or maybe separately, will materalise to take advantage on the property tax front.
The PMC aims to make this move effective from the financial year 2012-13. Also, the PMC is likely to extend this initiative to joint owners of property, with the women’s name listed as primary holder. This is because today almost 60% of the occupants in Pune have joint ownership of the property. “We have also received queries on if we would be giving concessions to women having joint ownership of the property, with their name mentioned first on the agreement. This is something we are working on and will announce soon, if any concession can be given in this front also,” says Vilas Kanade, chief of tax department, PMC. Today, almost 60% of the occupants in Pune have joint ownership of the property.”
Welcoming this decision, Atul Goel, director of Goel Ganga Group says, “This will not have an impact on the real estate industry as buyers incur this cost after purchase of the property. However, there will be an impact socially, with the government taking the cause of women empowerment. With this move, along with women property holders, a lot of people would be encouraged to add their wives names to the property.
All in all this initiative is envisaged to bring an amount of equality of women and their social security and the PMC is looking at introducing more such initiatives.
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