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Taxation


PMC collects fine from defaulters

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The Times of India 19.08.2009

PMC collects fine from defaulters

PATNA: Continuing its special drive against erring shop owners who throw garbage on city roads, the Patna Municipal Corporation (PMC) on Tuesday imposed fine on 23 such shopkeepers.

A PMC team conducted the drive on city's Fraser Road, Gandhi Maidan, Exhibition Road and New Market areas and found that 23 shopkeepers had not placed their dustbins, as asked earlier, and were throwing garbage on roads, which led to imposition of fine.

The PMC team also collected fine from three street vendors who too were found to be throwing garbage on roads.

"A total of Rs 3,200 was collected from the defaulters as fine," PMC Nootan Rajdhani circle executive officer Vinay Sharan Verma said.

The corporation had launched the drive on Monday and on the very first day Rs 2,500 was collected as fine from the erring shopkeepers.

Prior to the launch of the drive, the corporation had launched a three-day special drive informing the shopkeepers that they should keep their own dustbins and PMC special sanitation teams would collect the garbage from their shops so that roads could be kept clean.

Meanwhile, the Nootan Rajdhani circle has also got rid of many of the unused vehicles which had become junk and were lying on the circle's office premises for years together.

"A sum of Rs 5.80 lakh was earned by auction of these old vehicles," Verma said and added that competitive bidding, in which about 500 bidders took part, allowed the corporation to get higher prices for the old vehicles, base prices for which were fixed on the basis of the report of local motor vehicle inspector.
 

Valsaraj urges upward revision of water cess

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The Hindu - Puduchery 19.08.2009

Valsaraj urges upward revision of water cess

Staff Reporter

Speech at meet of Ministers of Environment and Forests

 


At present, the cess stands at three to 10 paise per 1,000 litres Pollution Control Committee lacks

sufficient manpower


PUDUCHERRY: Home Minister E. Valsaraj, who holds the environment portfolio, has urged the Centre to increase the water cess in the Union Territory. He was participating in the National Conference of Ministers of Environment and Forests at New Delhi on Tuesday.

According to a copy of the address released to the media here, Mr. Valsaraj said the Puducherry Pollution Control Committee (PPCC), which has over 2,000 industries under its purview, did not have adequate manpower.

It is operating under severe financial constraints. The consent and monitoring fees collected from industries was the only source of revenue. Water cess, which stands at three to 10 paise per 1,000 litres, must be considered for upward revision by the Centre, or else the territorial government should be empowered to revise it based on demand and availability of resources to fetch more revenue for the PPCC.

According to the amended Environment Impact Assessment Notification, 2006, powers had been delegated to State-level environmental impact assessment authorities to issue environmental clearance for Category B projects. Mr. Valsaraj pointed out that according to the general condition of the notification, “any project or activity specified in Category B will be treated as Category A if located within 10 km from the inter-State boundaries.”

He suggested that small States and Union Territories be exempted from this general condition, so that the State governments are empowered to issue clearances and avoid delay.

Mr. Valsaraj said that while the Union Territory has proposed to develop the Common Municipal Solid Waste Disposal Facility, identifying a suitable site for a Treatment, Storage and Disposal Facility (TSDF) was posing a problem. He requested the Union government to formulate a mechanism to share the TSDF.

The Minister suggested that the Ministry of Environment and Forests carry out a detailed study in coastal areas all over the country, that would enable the State governments to undertake economic and developmental activities without spoiling the beaches.

Last Updated on Wednesday, 19 August 2009 05:27
 

MC lax towards the RTI Act

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The Times of Indian 17.08.2009

MC lax towards the RTI Act

LUDHIANA: Though strict actions had been taken many a time against the Municipal Corporation (MC) officers due to there callous attitude towards giving the information under the Right to Information (RTI) act but they continue to defy the law as more then 60% of the total applications received by them ever since the inception of the act have not been replied yet.

This is contrary to the fact that two of its senior officers Joint Commissioner Mahinder Pal Gupta and Assistant Commissioner VK Sharda had tendered written unconditional apology from the State Information Commission. The information attained by the RTI activist Rohit Sabharwal the President of the Anti Corruption and crime investigation cell in this regard from the MC presents the grim picture of the havoc created by the civic body officers with the act that aims in empowering the general masses. Just look at this fact since the implementation of act from February 2nd, 2006 to March 31st, 2007 the civic body received 682 applications under the act out of which only 281 have been answered by it but 401 out of them are lying pending with it.

Similarly from April 1st, 2007 to March 31st, 2008 the MC received 963 applications under the act out of which 452 are lying pending with the civic body. But the civic body created the mess in the last year as April 1st, 2008 to March 31st, 2009 it received 1143 application sunder the act out of which only 353 have been answered and a whopping figure of 790 applications are still pending with it. In the same manner from April 1st 2009 till July 30th, 2009 the MC has received 310 applications out of which 184 are pending.

Talking to the TOI Sabharwal said that the present state of affairs as exposed by this information is only reflective of the chaotic state of affairs in the department. He said that all of this is despite the fact that the Punjab State Information Commission has penalized the MC officials more than two dozen times and has also directed disciplinary action under the Punjab Government Service Rules against their top brass. Sabharwal said that the basic intention of the MC officers behind denying information under the act is that their misdeeds should not come out in open to the public.
 

Property tax: GHMC in troubled waters

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The Hindu - Andhra Pradesh 15.08.2009

Property tax: GHMC in troubled waters

 

 

 

Cash-strapped corporation told to share tax collection with Water Board

 


GHMC finding it tough to even pay contractors

Revenue-expenditure gap is already widening


HYDERABAD: The government might be mulling to bring Water Board under GHMC but its decision ordering sharing 25 per cent of property tax collection with the former has set alarm bells ringing. The corporation was anyway staring down the barrel with a bad fiscal position.

If last year’s tax collection of about Rs. 380 crore is taken into account, at least Rs. 100 crore would have to be transferred to Water Board. With the economy downturn, municipal officials are hoping tax collection in the current financial year to be about Rs. 500 crore which meant that the Board’s share is Rs. 125 crore.

Considering that the civic body is huffing and puffing to pay even pending bills of contractors, it’s quite a heavy amount.

“The government orders will be followed though we are in a precarious state,” sighed a senior official.

Though an official order was issued last month to share the tax revenue, GHMC has disbursed close to Rs. 20 crore in the last few months on some pretext or other. Officials accept that recessionary trends are sure to impact tax collection not only from commercial buildings but also from residential because of several ‘To-let’ boards coming up.

The innumerable work orders issued for taking up civic projects to tone up the suburbs after they were aligned with the erstwhile MCH in the last couple of years has literally broken its back. Works of more than Rs. 1,000 crore were sanctioned fairly liberally and even this year it has earmarked a whopping more than Rs. 2,000 crore for capital works.

When it’s been struggling to complete or pay up for finished works and it has been accepted that other revenue outlets could be see a dip, where will the funds come from is a multi-crore question. The yawning gap between monthly revenue and expenditure is already widening.

Faint hope?

Officials, however, see a glimmer of hope in collecting Rs. 50-60 crore from processing Building Penalisation Scheme (BPS) applications this year. Demand notices for commercial and residential taxpayers in some of the posh localities based on the fresh data sourced from BPS applications about precise size of dwellings and conversion to commercial were being sent, explained an official. Yet, it won’t be sufficient to tide over the dire financial state.

Debris removal

The GHMC will be concentrating on debris removal from Monday onwards as part of the preparations to keep the capital spick and span round-the-clock in view of Ganesh and Ramzan festivals.

Commissioner S.P. Singh at a meeting said that extra staff and machinery would be pressed into service during this time and special focus will be on debris dumping points. Similarly, works pertaining to streetlights, illumination, sanitation and road repairs will be taken up .

Last Updated on Saturday, 15 August 2009 05:54
 

'Corp cannot collect parking fee on roads'

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The New Indian Express 14.08.2009

'Corp cannot collect parking fee on roads'


KOCHI: The Ombudsman for Local Bodies has rejected the Kochi Corporation’s claim that it had the right to collect parking fee on PWD roads.

Disallowing the Corporation from extending and renewing the contract for collecting parking fee, Ombudsman Justice M R Hariharan Nair directed the Local Self- Government Principal Secretary to issue orders relating to collecting of parking fee across the state.

The PWD opposed the claim raised by the Corporation which had asserted that it had the power to collect parking fee as it was collecting garbage and maintaining street lamps. The Ombudsman said the Corporation had no right to charge the fee as the road did not belong to it and there was no lease agreement between the two.

The Human Rights Defence Forum, through a petition, had challenged the Corporation charging parking fee on M G Road, Broadway, Shanmugham Road, Vytilla Junction road, and the area between Vytila-Thammanam Road and NH-47.

Last Updated on Friday, 14 August 2009 11:03
 


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