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General Administration

Government to re-classify 529 town panchayats

Wednesday, 03 April 2013 04:51 administrator
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The Hindu                    03.04.2013

Government to re-classify 529 town panchayats

T. Ramakrishnan

It will be done on the basis of fresh income criteria.

The government has decided to re-classify 529 town panchayats on the basis of fresh income criteria of the local bodies.

Announcing this in the Assembly on Tuesday at the end of the debate on the demands for grants of his departments, Municipal Administration and Rural Development Minister K.P. Munusamy said for town panchayats to be brought under special grade, their annual income should exceed Rs. 200 lakh; for selection grade, it should be in the range of Rs. 100 lakh to Rs. 200 lakh; for Grade I, the income should be in the range of Rs. 50 lakh to Rs. 100 lakh and for Grade II, the income should be less than Rs. 50 lakh.

[A senior government official explains that the reclassification would benefit people in the form of better level of supervision of the functioning of the local bodies and deployment of greater human resources to serve].

The need for the new classification arose as the existing classification was as per the income of the local bodies in 1993. Under the present norms, town panchayats with the annual income of over Rs. 20 lakh were called special grade; those in the range of Rs. 16 lakh to Rs. 20 lakh – selection grade; Rs. 8 lakh to Rs. 16 lakh – Grade I and Rs. 4 lakh to Rs. 8 lakh – Grade II. The break up of the town panchayats under the present norms was: special grade – 12 town panchayats; selection grade – 222; grade I – 215 and grade II – 80.

Service level

Pointing out that Chief Minister Jayalalithaa ordered the coverage of 6,000 rural habitations initially under the revised norm of 55 litres per capita per day (LPCD), the Minister said the coverage would be achieved through individual power pump schemes and combined water supply schemes at a cost of Rs. 1,190.72 crore, drawing the assistance from the Minimum Needs Programme/National Rural National Rural Drinking Water Programme.

[At present, the service level is 40 LPCD. Of 94,614 rural habitations in the State, around 91,000 habitations are fully covered with the rest partially covered, according to an official in the Tamil Nadu Water Supply and Drainage Board]. Proposals for eight combined water supply schemes, aimed at benefiting 10.66 lakh people in 3,005 rural habitations, 14 town panchayats and one municipality (Padamanabhapuram of Kanyakumari district) in the districts of Cuddalore, The Nilgiris, Erode, Tirupur, Theni and Sivaganga, would be taken up for survey this year.

A sum of Rs. 22 crore would be set apart for setting up 80 dog shelters and to purchase 60 vehicles to capture dogs. This was meant for municipalities and municipal corporations excluding Chennai. A new building would be constructed for Commissionerate of Municipal Administration and Directorate of Town Panachayats , the Minister added.

 

Poor response prompts civic body to float tender for third time

Monday, 01 April 2013 05:40 administrator
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The Hindu                     01.04.2013

Poor response prompts civic body to float tender for third time

Staff Reporter

With no tender documents submitted for the construction of new main office building for the City Municipal Corporation, the civic body has floated tender for the third time asking bidders to submit documents by May 9.

Officials said that there are no takers for the Rs. 7-crore project due to the financial year end as new Standard Schedule of Rates for the year 2013-14 would be revised by the Public Works Department that may be effective from May 1.

Hence, due to escalating cost of construction materials, contractors would wait and watch the new rates and participate in the tender process.

“This is usual during financial year end,” said a senior corporation official.

The cost of steel approved by the Schedule of Rates Committee for 2012-13 is Rs. 48,000 per metric tonne and cement is Rs. 5,200 per mt. The new rates for 2013-14 could be increased by about 5 to 10 per cent and hence, contractors are waiting for the new rates.

The second tender was floated on March 26, with bid submission starting from April 9 and closing on May 9.

The project is to construct the building at 1,25,150 sq ft to house all major departments and work is planned to be completed in 600 days.

 

Civic body moves HC to take possession of unutilised land

Sunday, 31 March 2013 00:00 administrator
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The Hindu                         31.03.2013

Civic body moves HC to take possession of unutilised land

no claimant:The unused 96-year-old reading room in Manapparai.— PHOTO:R.M. RAJARATHINAM.
no claimant:The unused 96-year-old reading room in Manapparai.— PHOTO:R.M. RAJARATHINAM.
 
1.22-acre site classified in village register as ‘local fund reading room’

Will Manapparai municipality ever get possession of the 96-year-old reading room and the 1.22-acre site on which it is constructed? Now the municipality has moved the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court in this regard.

Despite S. Malathi, secretary, Municipal Administration and Water Supply Department, categorically directing the Collector in 1997 to help the municipality take possession of the land without any impediments, it was not handed over to the civic body. But the Revenue Department took possession and retained the same for use as Taluk Supply Office. After 2005, as the building became dilapidated, it was allowed to remain unused.

Similarly, Niranjan Mardi, secretary, Municipal Administration and Water Supply, in his communication to the Collector on February 28, 2007, wanted him to hand over the site to the local body immediately.

He dismissed the letter of the tahsildar to the commissioner of Manapparai municipality asking for remitting the land cost as “irrelevant and not germane to the case”. He has also pointed out that the site lies unutilised with a dilapidated tiled building on its premises. Now the chairperson of the municipality, V. Shantha Veerachamy, has moved the Madras High Court seeking possession of the property as the village register has classified it as “local fund reading room”. She has submitted that at present, the property, which is in the heart of the municipality, remains unutilised and none of the government authorities is utilising it.

If the property was handed over to the municipality, it could be utilised for the welfare of the municipality and the general public. She has suggested that the municipality augment the revenue by constructing a multipurpose shopping complex there because this site is between the bus stand and the railway station.

The municipal council passed a resolution on November 27, 2012, directing the chairperson to take up the matter with the government.

However, the Principal Secretary and Commissioner of Land Administration, in his letter dated July 5, 2010, had said “as the municipality has failed to maintain the land free from encroachment when it was under its control as reading room and a legal battle had been fought to take possession of the land from encroachers”, the municipality need not be permitted inside the land to carry out any activities. “The request of the municipality lacks merit and is rejected.”

 
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