Tamil Nadu - Coimbatore   

Recurring penalty halved

By Our Staff Reporter

COIMBATORE, JAN. 17 . After a five-hour special meeting to resolve various issues facing the public, the Coimbatore Corporation Council today decided to reduce the recurring penalty on unauthorised structures to 25 paise a sq.ft. for buildings up to 3,000 sq.ft. For buildings above this size, the penalty was retained at 50 paise.

The revised rates would take effect on April 1, and were applicable to the unauthorised structures in both the approved and unapproved layouts, the Mayor, T. Malaravan, announced. However, regularisation of the unapproved layouts and unauthorised structures in approved layouts would be dealt with by the Government under a separate scheme.

The penalty was abolished for buildings constructed by low-income groups on sites provided by the Government. The Council exempted structures with plan deviation on the grounds that there might not have been an option for the house owners as the sites allocated to them ranged only from one-and-a-half to two cents.

13-year struggle

The announcement of revised rates for structures below 3,000 sq.ft. brought partial success to a 13-year struggle against recurring penalty. During the tenure of the previous Council (1996-2001) and the present one since 2001, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam-led Opposition demanded that the penalty be reduced to 10 paise a sq.ft. However, the Corporation had maintained that a drastic reduction would cost it heavily.

The Mayor told presspersons after the meeting that the loss due to penalty reduction could be offset by the revenue from drinking water connections the civic body proposed to provide in the unapproved layouts. At present, the Corporation spent around Rs. 1 crore a year on providing water in tankers to over 400 layouts.

Now, through water consumption charges and estimate charges (during the connections), the Corporation hoped to make Rs. 3 crores.

Road improvement

A more significant decision arrived at was taking up for maintenance and improvements of roads and other infrastructure in layouts that belonged to various local bodies, which were made a part of the city in May 1981, when the Coimbatore Municipality was upgraded into a Corporation.

The resolution adopted today, after discussions with leaders of ruling All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and Opposition in the Council, stated that the existing amenities would be taken up by the Corporation after verifying whether the layouts and buildings in the added areas had been assessed for Property Tax by the respective local bodies prior to 1981.

Following complaints from Councillors that industrial areas reeled under poor conditions, the Council also resolved that these would be provided with good roads and other basic amenities but with 25 per cent funding by the beneficiaries under the Rural Self-Sufficiency Scheme. Barring the reduction of penalty, the other resolutions passed by the Council would be forwarded to the Government for approval.

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