The Hindu : Kerala / Thiruvananthapuram News : Budget proposals adopted; steps promised to raise revenue

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Friday, Mar 11, 2005

Kerala

Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram

Budget proposals adopted; steps promised to raise revenue

By Our Staff Reporter

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, MARCH 10. The city corporation council today adopted the budget proposals for the 2005-06 financial year after a daylong debate which saw the Opposition United Democratic Front (UDF) staging a walkout alleging distortion of figures.

There is no change in the estimated revenue receipts of Rs. 157.13 crores and expenditure of Rs. 152.37 crores. The UDF members, who participated in the general discussions, walked out of the council hall before head-wise allocations were taken up.

The Communist Marxist Party leader M.P. Saju raised an objection, pointing out that allocations for several projects announced in the budget speech did not match the figures given in tables. The UDF council party leader K. Maheswaran Nair took up the issue, alleging that the budget discussions were tightly scheduled with the presentation to cover up anomalies and evade serious debate.

The bid of Finance Standing Committee member Chala Mohanan to clarify the issue led to a loud protest from the UDF members who alleged that allocations adopted by the committee were altered at a later stage. Not satisfied with the explanations by the Deputy Mayor, M. Sujanapriyan, and the Mayor, J. Chandra, the UDF councillors trooped out. The Bharatiya Janata Party and the People's Democratic Party did not join the walkout. The head-wise allocations were later adopted by the council.

Party feud

Earlier, during the general discussion, Mr. Maheswaran Nair alleged that the budget proposals did not reflect the development needs of the city. He said intra-party feud in the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) had prevented the ruling front from fulfilling the commitments in the previous budgets. Terming the Mayor a hapless victim of factional rivalry within her party, he said the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) leadership had failed to crackdown on corruption.

Mr. Nair also alleged that standing committees had become powerless in discharging their duties.

Countering the charges, the LDF benches accused the Opposition of politicising development. They said the Government's failure to recognise tender excess for public works taken up by local bodies had impeded many projects. The LDF leaders said political corruption was absent in the corporation.

Scam alleged

The Sasthamangalam councillor and Finance Standing Committee member, S. Sreekumar (CPI-M), alleged that a section of corporation employees was involved in a scam involving misuse of funds. The spiralling expense on fuel for garbage lorries indicated the presence of a well-entrenched racket involved in siphoning off funds.

Observing that the fuel expense had doubled from Rs. 6 lakhs over a 10- month period from last April, he said registers and logbooks were being tampered with to show inflated figures. The Mayor assured the council that the issue would be probed.

Rounding off the debate, Mr. Sujanapriyan promised effective steps to enhance revenue from registration of private institutions. He said moves were afoot to bring all institutions within the tax bracket. The Deputy Mayor also promised to look into the possibility of extending the proposed building tax exemption to the houses constructed under the Thanal scheme.

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