To recover dues of over Rs 1000 crore, the Punjab Local Bodies department has launched a one-time settlement (OTS) scheme for pending water and sewerage bills. (Representational)
To recover dues of over Rs 1000 crore, the Punjab Local Bodies department has launched a one-time settlement (OTS) scheme for pending water and sewerage bills. The pending amount relates to 13 municipal corporations in Punjab.
The pending dues can be paid back by defaulters till May 31, 2020 without the interest amount that will be waived off.
“This move has been introduced after about a decade so as to collect at least the principal amount. Urban Local Bodies will be rich enough if all the defaulters show up to pay only principal amount,” Local Bodies Minister Brahm Mohindra told The Indian Express.
As per the data available with The Indian Express, Ludhiana is number one in the defaulters list with Rs 383.24 crore as pending dues till financial year 2018-19. For the current financial year, Ludhiana’s target is Rs 75 crore out of which till now around Rs 40 crore has been collected.
SAS Nagar comes at number 2 which has pending amount of Rs 249.77 crore till 2018-19. Amritsar is the next with Rs 197 crore pending, followed by Jalandhar at Rs 139 crore. Bathinda’s outstanding amount is Rs 52.49 crore, followed by Patiala at Rs 25.06 crore, while Phagwara’s outstanding amount is Rs 13.28 crore.
Interestingly, the newly formed Abohar Municipal Corporation’s default amount is Rs 6.74 crore, while Batala and Kapurthala’s default amount within one year of formation of Municipal Corporation is Rs 1.83 crore and 9.73 crore, respectively. Batala, Kapurthala and Abohar were upgraded as Municipal Corporations in March, 2019.
Moga’s pending for the past one year was available in local bodies record which was Rs 1.24 crore, while Pathankot’s outstanding amount to be recovered from defaulters for 2017-18 and 2018-19 is Rs 5.66 crore.
Not all the corporations have calculated their interest amount which is 18 per cent of surcharge on the total bill.
Kapurthala’s interest amount is Rs 1.95 crore, which will be waived off, while Ludhiana’s interest amount worth Rs 216 crore.