(a) For the purpose of collecting the revenue embraced in the provisions of this chapter, the receiver and back-tax collector is empowered and authorized to file a general creditors' bill in the name of the state, in behalf of all creditors, against all the delinquent taxpayers who owed taxes to the extinct corporation at the time of the surrender or repeal of its charter, which shall be filed in the circuit court, held in and for the county in which the extinct corporation was situated.
(b)
(1) All the delinquents in any one (1) county shall be embraced in one (1) summons to answer.
(2) For the issuance of the summons, the clerk shall receive a fee of five cents (5cent(s)) for each defendant named in the summons, except for the first, and for that the fee allowed by law in other cases. However, he or she shall not receive a fee exceeding twenty dollars ($20.00) for the summons.
(3) The sheriff, for serving the summons, shall receive for each defendant ten cents (10cent(s)), except for the first, and for that the fee allowed for like services in other cases.
(c) Publication for nonresidents shall embrace in the same publication, if practicable, all nonresident defendants, the object being to make one (1) proceeding embrace the whole taxes of any one of the extinct corporations.
(d) All pending suits in favor of any of the extinct corporations are to be revived in the name of the state and consolidated with the general proceedings provided for in this chapter and when so consolidated shall form part of the general proceeding.
(e)
(1) The court in which the proceeding may be instituted shall have power to settle and adjust all equities, priorities, and liens and to give all relief, both to the defendants and creditors, that might be given if there were as many separate suits as there are creditors and delinquent taxpayers.
(2)
(A) The court shall have power to enforce all liens upon property for the payment of the taxes and to order and make all sales of property necessary to the collection of the taxes.
(B) The taxes embraced by this chapter, and which it provides for, are all taxes imposed by extinct municipal corporations up to the time of the surrender or repeal of their respective charters, and none other.