Urban riches

This refers to the letter, ‘Urban tax (June 29) by Salman Tahir. The writer has a priceless suggestion for the government: to impose urban tax as a quick fix recipe to fill its coffers through a very simple process of direct taxation of the ‘rich’ living in urban areas. The writer has defined richness as the occupation, to start with, of one kanal house irrespective of the status of its occupant.
This golden principle has already been adopted and being followed by the ‘egalitarian’ PTI government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa under the nomenclature of urban property tax since last year which, in one quantum jump, has raised property tax on one kanal house from Rs3,200 to Rs10,080. Without seeking to dispute the sagacity and ingenuity of such an idea and step, I request the writer to elaborate: does a destitute widow or an aged government pensioner, who is solely dependent on meagre financial income and who by some stroke of luck or chance happen to live in a one kanal house, deserve the honourable title of a rich urbanite?
Niaz Ahmad Khan
Peshawar