Even as pressure from the Chief Minister forced BBMP to go back on
its plan to pledge the Town Hall as collateral for a bank loan, Mayor B
S  Sathyanarayana has come up with a new suggestion: selling some
properties of the Corporation to pay off debts.

Speaking to
reporters on Friday, the Mayor attempted to distance his administration
from the proposal to pledge Town Hall to avail a loan from Canara Bank.
He claimed that the proposal had neither come from the standing
committee nor the Council. “We do not have any intention of pledging any
heritage building, which has historic value,” he said.

When
asked whether the Palike had planned to pledge Johnson Market or Russell
Market instead of the Town Hall, the Mayor said he was not aware of any
such proposal and added that these also would not be pledged.

Arguing
for the need to consider selling BBMP properties that had been given on
lease, the Mayor said the lease periods had expired in case of many
properties. “I have asked officials to give a list of such properties.
Also, many properties are given on long-term contracts and the BBMP gets
no revenue from them. The Palike can sell it to the lessee as per the
market price. We can also go in for auction. However, this is my
personal opinion. We need to take the opinion of the Council and State
government,” he said.

Special Govt Grants

The Mayor said
BBMP has around `3,600 crore  outstanding loans including `1,600 crore
in payments to contractors. “The State government should give special
grants to BBMP so that it can stand on its own feet. The Palike needs
funds to clear old loans and take up development works,” he said. He
called on the government to release at least `1,000 crore per year.

Referring
to the internal audit recommendations which had called for the recovery
of more than `300 crore from officials involved in irregularities, the
Mayor  said a special meeting will be held next week to discuss the
issue. “It is not a small amount. We shall recover it from the officials
by attaching their salaries. Even if they were transferred to different
agency, we can still attach their salaries. However, we need to hold
discussions on what to do about officials who were dead and retired,” he
said.

Pledging Not Solution: Opposition

Bangalore: The
leader of the opposition in the BBMP Council Manjunath Reddy said
pledging buildings was not the solution to come out of debt. “BBMP has
the capacity to generate revenue. It needs to tackle tax defaulters.
With Akrama-Sakrama, Palike’s revenues will definitely get a boost,” he
said. He alleged that while pledging of KR Market and Public Utility
Building had come to the notice of the Council, remaining cases,
including pledging Rajajinagar, Johnson and Malleswaram markets, had
not. “The administration has taken approval directly from the
government,” he said. The Public Utility Building was pledged thrice
last year, he added.