The Hindu                    13.02.2013

Municipality threatens to snap water connections of defaulters

Rs.15 crore due from residents and institutions under various heads in Karur.

Worried over mounting dues, the Karur Municipality has decided to get tough with tax defaulters in the civic body limits, holding out a threat to disconnect drinking water supply connections.

A recent meeting of chairman M.Selvaraj, commissioner (in charge) Gopalakrishnan, and other officials took stock of the tax dues in the municipality and noted that an estimated Rs.15 crore was due from its residents and institutions under various head such as profession tax, drinking water supply tax, property tax besides the non taxable outstanding that should be received by the civic body. During the recent council meetings some members had taken objection to the perceived lax attitude of the municipality in collecting revenue dues and had called for expeditious efforts to recover the dues from the defaulters and the special meeting followed those calls.

Pointing to the lackadaisical attitude of the defaulters in paying the municipality its dues, the meeting decided to toughen its stance.

Thereby, the meeting resolved unanimously to take stringent measures to convey the municipality’s strong disapproval by even resorting to disconnection of drinking water supply connection to defaulters.

The meeting also noted that with the expanded area covering 48 wards the Karur Municipality was striving to serve its population by improving drinking water supply and other basic amenities through implementing various development schemes.

In particular the scheme to provide drinking water supply to Thanthoni, Inam Karur and Karur regions not served by the Cauvery water supply schemes required funding to install and operate the schemes. If support through proper and timely payment of dues was not resorted to by the residents the civic body would be strained to extend the services.

Besides, the municipality was also pressing into operation generators to keep the motors in the pump rooms and lifting stations running to feed the water supply scheme beneficiary hamlets and localities. For that substantial amount was required as there were frequent power cuts. The civic body is hard pressed for resource mobilization and it was the duty of all residents to promptly pay the tax dues, the meeting observed.