Nagpur: The Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) has serious reason to worry about its precarious financial health. Its revenue in the first six months paints a worrisome picture — against a target of Rs2,946 crore for the current fiscal 2018-19, the civic body has earned only Rs598.65 crore — that roughly translates to about one-fifth of the target.
As per the projections of standing committee chairman Virendra Kukreja, the NMC should have earned Rs1,473 crore till September 30.
It will not be easy for the NMC to achieve the revenue target set by Kukreja. He had set an ambitious target of Rs2,946 crore, though it was Rs 1,747.55 crore in the last fiscal.
Sources pointed out that with several ongoing big projects like cement road works of Phase-I, II and III and orange street project likely to kick off this year, liabilities of the NMC will grow further.
The dip in the revenue has pushed the civic body to tighten its purse strings. It means that the civic body must either find new ways to increase revenue or fund its infrastructure projects by borrowing from different sources and it has already approached Bank of Maharashtra for topping up its existing loan by Rs 200 crore.
In either case, citizens will have to bear the burden. There are no imminent plans to increase taxes as the NMC had already revised the property tax in 2015. However, if the decline in revenue continues, citizens may be staring at lack of civic amenities. Sources cited a recent example wherein the civic administration stalled corporators’ proposals worth over Rs35 crore for asphalting roads for want of funds.
“Since 2012, the civic body has been unable to match the target income,” said senior Congress corporator Praful Gudadhe. He, however, pointed out that the shortfall was due to the inflated revenue targets set by the standing committee. BJP members keep inflating the budget every year while the liability of the civic body is increasing every year, he added.
Civic contractors too have started protesting against the NMC over delay in releasing their payments. As per NMC’s accounts and finance department, the outstanding payments of contractors have crossed Rs300 crore. A civil contractor, Rajesh Rangari, who is battling with the NMC to clear his outstanding payments of Rs50 lakh, has sought poison from the NMC if it can’t clear his dues. Rangari has also printed pamphlets highlighting his problems like no money to pay fees of his children, no payments to contractors supplying material, defaulting bank instalment etc due to non-payment by the NMC.
While Kukreja was not available for comments, mayor Nanda Jichkar acknowledged the NMC’s serious financial condition. She claimed that the NMC has initiated several measures to improve revenue generation. “The civic body has already hiked the fares of Aapli Bus to overcome losses and efforts are being made to recover revised rents of shops owned by NMC and review meetings have been convened to improve property tax collections,” the mayor claimed.
