LUCKNOW: The mayor might have ordered a probe into the cause of flood-like situation in the city on Monday, but a reality check of LMC’s expense and efforts on drain maintenance reveals that the corporation not only allocated less than 12% this year on
drain repair compared to last few years, but it also failed to arrange for complete cleaning of drains before monsoons.
An LMC official told TOI, “While earlier Rs 20-25 crore were spent every year to strengthen old drains and construct new ones, this year LMC was able to make only 5-6 drains and strengthen only a few of them as it could afford only about Rs 3 crore from its coffers.” In this year’s budget, LMC’s allocation towards roads and drain repair was already cut down by one-third (Rs60 crore this year compared to Rs 90 crore last year). Moreover, funds were not released on time to the corporators.
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More than funding, laxity of LMC is responsible for the perennial problem of waterlogging in the city. TOI had highlighted last month how silt dumped on the roadside after cleaning of drains flowed back in the first monsoon shower itself, leading to choking of drains again. All the money spent on cleaning literally went down the drain. LMC, which is reeling under financial crises, should have made optimum utilisation of available funds. The state government should also pay attention to the needs of LMC because eventual beneficiary is the public
Four months have gone by in this financial year, but the corporators have got just about Rs 27 lakh each (around 30% of total ward development fund) to get all major repair works done. While corporators are accusing LMC of not providing them with enough funds and not even cooperating in construction and repair of drains before monsoons, LMC has accused the government for not releasing
infrastructure funds on time.
Municipal commissioner Indramani Tripathi said, “We have not received the second instalment of infrastructure funds from the government for FY 2017 and 18 and we have not got any money this year too. We are trying to manage with our own funds. We recently gave around Rs 27 lakh to each ward but that got distributed in many works like roads, drains, supply etc.”
The mayor might have ordered a probe into the cause of flood-like situation in the city on Monday, but a reality check of LMC’s expense and efforts on drain maintenance reveals that the corporation not only allocated less than 12% this year on drain repair compared to last few years, but it also failed to arrange for complete cleaning of drains before monsoons.
An LMC official told TOI, “While earlier Rs 20-25 crore were spent every year to strengthen old drains and construct new ones, this year LMC was able to make only 5-6 drains and strengthen only a few of them as it could afford only about Rs 3 crore from its coffers.” In this year’s budget, LMC’s allocation towards roads and drain repair was already cut down by one-third (Rs60 crore this year compared to Rs 90 crore last year). Moreover, funds were not released on time to the corporators.
Four months have gone by in this financial year, but the corporators have got just about Rs 27 lakh each (around 30% of total ward development fund) to get all major repair works done. While corporators are accusing LMC of not providing them with enough funds and not even cooperating in construction and repair of drains before monsoons, LMC has accused the government for not releasing infrastructure funds on time.
Municipal commissioner Indramani Tripathi said, “We have not received the second instalment of infrastructure funds from the government for FY 2017 and 18 and we have not got any money this year too. We are trying to manage with our own funds. We recently gave around Rs 27 lakh to each ward but that got distributed in many works like roads, drains, supply etc.”
The mayor have ordered a probe into the cause of flood-like situation in the city on Monday.
