NAGPUR: In a classic example of how the Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) fails to meet its revenue targets, the market department has collected only 45.09 lakh from April 1 to June 15 as against a target of 107.76 crore. This comes to only 0.418% of the targeted sum.

These figures clearly indicate that the market department, which plays a key role in collection of revenue for the civic body, is lagging far behind. The market department staff of NMC is responsible for collecting dues from the over six lakh authorised and unauthorised hawkers and shop owners in markets in the city. The figures indicate that something is amiss. Market department sources say that the reason for the low collection is the lack of staff. NMC sources say they also lack agents who can go out into the field and collect fees and taxes from reluctant parties.

The sources say that there 12 types of posts in the market department, ranging from market supervisors to chowkidars, with a sanctioned staff strength of 84. Out of these, 23 posts are vacant while 29 other officials have been deputed to work in other departments. This leaves only 32 people working in the market department.

The agents presently at work are also supposed to be extremely lethargic and corrupt, while the officials turn a blind eye to the affairs. As a result, one of the key revenue sources for the civic body is being neglected, resulting in huge losses for NMC.

Some of the figures available with TOI are shocking. For rent collected from shops, the NMC had set a target of 4.20 crore but collected a meagre 13 lakh. From weekly and daily markets, the civic body had set a target of 6 lakh but ended up collecting 66,560 instead. The target for fees collected from hawkers was set at Rs 1 crore, but all that the agents could manage to collect was 5.62 lakh. That's not all. The officials have not even started to collect the rickshaw tax, the target for which was set as 20,000.

The highest target of 101 crore was set for rent from shopping complexes developed by NMC, but the officials have barely collected 8.35 lakh in this period. The civic body also lost out on a sizeable amount of revenue by not meeting the target of 1.50 crore from miscellaneous costs, and ended up earning only 17.45 lakh.

A source from the market committee informed that NMC had replaced the old scheme of collecting 2 per day from each hawker with a new scheme of collecting 1,000 per annum from the hawkers. This new scheme was adopted five months back. "If implemented in the right spirit, NMC can save up to 1 lakh under this scheme but officials are very lazy and do not work towards collection of revenue under various heads," said the market committee member. Repeated efforts to reach NMC officials failed.