Whatever...

I was away for an year and had not received any property tax notice. So  was not sure how to pay the property tax at all since there was no base document with amount etc. So, I went to the GHMC office in Serilingampally and met a person in Revenue department. The process is quite straight forward. All you need is the TPIN of your house. You can get this from your old notices or receipts of property tax (even if the notice is not in your name). You simply have to give them the TPIN and they will tell you the amount with penalty, if any. Pay it by cash or by cheque and your receipt is handed over to you then and there. Easy! Apparently, this can also be done at any e-Seva counter. But, I have not tried it yet.

Happy new year 2015 to you! Hope you spend hours and days on roads without traffic in the coming years. I had a dream new year eve - on the road, going home. After numerous previous road travels on this route (read here  and here ), this time I decided to travel by my Royal Enfield Std 350. I was short on any sort of planning time, so decided to use my experience and just take the route taken before.  Google maps says it should take about 14 hours to do this journey. However, we took a night halt at Raichur and including the halt, completed the journey in 29 hours. Our itinerary , roughly, was: 30.12.2014, 16:00 - Depart from Lingampally, Hyderabad 30.12.2014, 21:15 - Reach Raichur, Karnataka  Night Halt at Hotel Kubera Palace @ INR1400 per night including complimentary breakfast Better option is Hoten Kritunga which we took last time 31.12.2014, 08:30 - Depart from Raichur, Karnataka  31.12.2014, 09:30 - Puncture in rear tyre about 40 Kms from R...

It's that time of the year when the GHMC property tax notice has reached you and you want to pay the tax before deadline (30th June 2014) without attracting penalty. While GHMC tells you there are multiple ways of paying, ranging from online (most convenient) to visiting the circle office (least convenient), all of them have their plus and minus points. While online payment is most convenient, most of the time it doesn't work and an error is thrown . You end up wondering if it really got paid or not. Paying at the Municipality circle office is the most sure shot way, but they follow strict office timings (which coincide with your office timings), are crowded and they accept only DDs. From my experience, the most convenient way to pay GHMC property tax is through APonline or eSeva counters. These have extended working hours, are plenty in numbers and are not much crowded. The only flip side is they accept cash only. Moreover, they charge a commission of Rs.10 per Rs.1000 pa...

It's been close to a year since we bought a new flat in Hyderabad. It has been one hell of a learning exercise for the sheer amount of paper work and procedures it involved before, during or after the purchase. Buying a house in Hyderabad has been an exciting and taxing journey, so far. All through this journey, I had a desire to document my experiences so that it would help others who wished to be helped. But luck, laziness and life kept me away from this. However, I'll at least start now with an account of what needs to be done to change the ownership records in GHMC [Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation]. The first time it struck me that I need to do this is when I received a property tax notice addressed to the previous owner of the flat (we made a second hand purchase). All along I thought once I had registered with the land records department, the government would take care of updating all other records. I was so wrong! So, I rushed to the nearest Municipal Citizen...

Disclaimer - there are airlines and travel agencies mentioned in the post that follows. This is merely for information purpose and not a promotional mention. The experiences mentioned here are my personal and to each his own. We have been living in Hyderabad for last 4 years. I was here for another year and half before that. That is a long enough time period to advise people on how to get from Hyderabad to Goa by various means. I have been to Goa by train, air and road (there is no water route :-) ). To save you the jhigjhig  of going through the entire article let me put forth some rough guidelines for travel to Goa. Taking a Volvo bus is currently the best alternative for travelling to Goa. Flights are freaking expensive. Trains take an eternity. If you are travelling with kids who can't tell they want to pee or want to go 'outside' If you are on a budget, take the train If you have enough money, fly Now, having set the basic premise, let us get into the d...