Urban News

The Hindu 10.09.2009

Karur Collector stresses safe disposal of waste

Staff Reporter

ALL PRAISE: Karur Collector J. Uma Maheswari (third from right) at the garbage safe disposal site near Sathyamangalam on Tuesday.

KULITHALAI: Awareness and sustained education need to be furthered among the public in maintaining the houses and towns clean and green. Spread of contagious diseases could be nullified in towns that take proper care in safe disposal of civic waste, according to Karur District Collector J. Uma Maheswari.

Addressing the regional workshop on “Strategies and Options for Decentralised Solid Waste Management,” here on Tuesday, Dr. Uma Maheswari lauded the initiative of the Kulithalai Municipality in implementing a novel solid waste management collection and disposal method in 12 of the 24 wards in the civic area that borders the Cauvery.

Elected representatives and officials of local bodies could take a cue from the efforts of the Kulithalai Municipality Chairman A. Amuthavel and Commissioner Dhanalakshmi who had infused a sense of public cleanliness and sanitation among the townsmen. In fact Karur town should also try to initiate such an endeavour to keep the city clean by going in for segregation of solid waste at the source itself through proper door-to-door collection of garbage in segregated form.

The Collector lauded the role of sanitary workers engaged in the task, saying their work was central to the success of the whole scheme.

“Proper disposal of civic waste was not a help we are doing to others. Rather we are helping ourselves in keeping our environs clean and we should take the lead in ensuring that all lead a healthy life in clean surroundings,” Dr. Uma Maheswari said.

Exnora Advisor V. Ganapathy, officials and public health officers from various civic bodies in the region took part in the deliberations and the field studies arranged as part of the workshop.

The Hindu 10.09.2009

Now, pay property tax on mobile phone

Staff Reporter

CHENNAI: Remitting your property tax has just got easier: the Chennai Corporation on Wednesday launched a system under which payment could be made using GPRS-enabled mobile phones. Launching the service, Mayor M. Subramanian said the civic body had introduced several modes of payment to improve property tax collection. The initiatives had proved beneficial, with the collection improving from Rs.231.94 crore in 2006-07 to Rs.323.80 crore in 2008-09. The target this fiscal is Rs.375 crore. “We are confident of achieving the target… till yesterday [Tuesday] property the tax collection was Rs.117 crore,” he added.

Assessees will have to send a text message ‘ngpay’ to the number 56767. They will then receive an SMS with a link to download an application form from ngpay, the private firm that provides the payment solution. This has to be followed by a one-time registration process, submitting details such as name, address and e-mail ID. Manoj Nair, senior vice-president of ngpay, said that once the bill number assigned to the assessee is fed into the application form, the property tax details would be available. The tax could be paid using Visa or Master credit cards or Visa debit cards. HDFC Bank customers could pay by giving their account number. Corporation Commissioner Rajesh Lakhoni said an SMS giving the receipt number towards the payment made would be sent to the payee immediately. A copy of the receipt would be sent by e-mail and by post.