MCC pre-budget public consultation meeting held

Mysuru: The pre-budget public consultation meeting of Mysuru City Corporation (MCC) was held at the  Old Council Hall on Jan. 23. Elected representatives and citizens took stock of the budgetary allocations and expenditure during 2018-19 and also discussed some of the proposals to be implemented in 2019-2020 fiscal.

At the meeting, former Mayors, Deputy Mayors and Corporators questioned the laxity adopted by officials in collecting taxes. They alleged that officials were not collecting taxes properly and this had considerably reduced the MCC revenues.

“The MCC collects Rs.12 crore as taxes every month but spends Rs.10 crore for administration, maintenance and other expenditure. How can development works be undertaken with the remaining Rs.2 crore,” they questioned.

Corporator Arif Hussain said that the previous government used to release funds for the cash-strapped MCC and somehow, development works would be undertaken. “There is a deep financial crisis in the present coalition government and funds have not been released. Even the MLA grant has not been released. It is an useless exercise to wait for government grants and instead, the MCC must gear up to mobilise funds by tightening the tax collection drive,” he opined.

MCC Revenue Inspector Kumar Naik told in the meeting that Rs. 210 crore taxes were pending and of this, Rs.105 crore has been collected so far. He added that the revenue structure has remained static since 2007 and the government must take steps to increase taxes so that the MCC revenue will get a boost.

Former Mayor Ayub Khan raised the issue of advertisements and said that the revenue from advertisements has stopped and earlier, the MCC used to generate crores of rupees as revenue.

He also said that many shops rented out by the MCC at Makkaji Chowk, Subhash Nagar, Boti Bazaar and other areas have remained unoccupied for years.

President of MCC Contractors Association Chandrashekharaiah complained that the contractors’ dues have not been cleared by the MCC since the last three years. Rs.140 crore has to be released, he said.

Even the money spent by contractors for Dasara works have not been reimbursed and the contractors were facing difficulties as they have taken loans from banks, he said.

Former Mayor Modamani opined that special schemes must be launched in the next budget for the welfare of women. Mayor Pushpalatha Jagannath, Deputy Mayor Shafi Ahmed, MCC Commissioner K.H. Jagadeesha and others were present.