The New Indian Express 06.04.2013
About 300 cheques for Rs 2 crore issued by house owners towards payment of property tax to the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation for the recently- ended financial year 2012-13 have bounced.
The GHMC has decided to initiate legal action against the ratepayers whose cheques bounced. In the meanwhile, it has engaged a private consultant to recover money from the defaulters.
GHMC is contemplating not to entertain cheques hereafter and to insist on DDs, cash and other mode of hassle-free payments.
Besides lack of sufficient funds in their bank accounts, several cheques bounced due to incomplete signatures, overwriting and corrections to signatures without making counter-signatures. The bankers rejected such cheques.
Speaking to Express, additional commissioner (finance) K Ashok Reddy said the consultant would serve notices on the owners, whose cheques bounced, under the Negotiable Instruments Act. A 15-day-time will be given to them to clear their dues with penal interest. If they fail to do so within 15 days, criminal cases will be registered against them for issuing cheques which were dishonoured for lack of funds in their bank accounts.
Actually, 2,414 cheques to the tune of Rs 9.10 crore bounced but, after stern warnings, the corporation recovered over Rs 7 crore from 2,162 property-owners.
A few hundred more cheques, which were issued on the last day (March 31) of the financial year, are yet to be cleared. GHMC will wait for a few more days for their clearing and credit of the money into its account. GHMC anticipates bouncing of some more cheques.
