"ملف F/2 II مراسلات متنوّعة مع بلدية المنامة" [و‎‎٦‎١] (٤٦٤/١٢١)

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51
House tax in the Municipalities of Manamah and Muharraq.
Note of a conversation between Shaikh Abdullah bin r Isa
A1 Khalifah, President of the Muharraq %nicipality and Acting
President of the Manamah Municipality, Mr. Belgrave, Adviser
to the Bahrain Government, Muhammad Salih Shatr, Secretary of
the Manamah Municipality, and the Political Agent.
\ These conversations arose from correspondence with
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the Agency terminating with the Adviser f s demi-official letter
to the Political Agent dated the 21st ^une 1935. Before dealing
with the facts of the conversation it would be as well to set forti
the constitution of both these Municipalities and their methods
of taxation with regard to house property.
^ The Manamah Municipality was instituted 12 or 13 years
ago by Major (now Colonel) Dickson and the %harraq Municipality
some years later by Mr. Belgrave on exactly the same lines as
the Manamah Municipality. The method of house taxation in both
Municipalities was that the tenant should pay house tax and not
the landlords. Taxes payable were assessed at -/ 2 /~ in the
rupee on the rent. This system has been maintained to the
the
present day in/Muharraq Municipality.
^ In Manamah during the time that Captain (now Major)
Prior was Political Agent, he and Mr. Belgrave introduced the
more normal system of making the house-owners pay the house tax
in the case of the residential area only. So far as the bazaar
was concernedcthe old system, whereby the tenants pay house tax
w^as retained. The system of requiring the house-owners to pay
the tax failed for the following reasons and was abandoned
after 11 months trial.
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