Srikakulam: Civic bodies face funds crunch amid coronavirus pandemic

Srikakulam: Three municipalities Itchapuram, Palasa and Amudalavalasa along with Srikakulam Municipal Corporation (SMC) and two Nagara Panchayats, Rajam and Palakonda in the district are facing funds crunch.

The State government is yet to grant special funds for these municipalities to meet expenditure for Covid-19 operations like purchase of sanitary material, maintenance of vehicles, wages for sanitary workers, safety material for these workers and various liquids like sodium hypochlorite, phenol and chlorine etc.

In addition to this, property tax amount was also not collected in these Municipalities as per targets for financial year 2019-20. Targeted amount of property tax for SMC was Rs 14 crore. However, the collected amount was Rs 10 crore so far. In Palasa, target was Rs 4.7 crore but collected Rs 2.6 crore. In Itchapuram target amount was Rs 2.2 crore and collected amount so far was Rs 1.2 crore. In Amudalavalasa, target amount was Rs 2.6 crore and collected amount was Rs 1.48 crore. In Rajam target amount was Rs 1.28 crore and collected amount was Rs 90 lakhs. In Palakonda target amount was Rs 1.2 crore but collected only Rs 40 lakh.

For Covid-19 operations, Rs 5 lakh was spent in Itchapuram, Rs 12 lakh in Palasa municipality, Rs 4 lakh in Palakonda, Rs 3 lakh in Rajam and Rs 4 lakh in Amudalavalasa from general funds so far.

"Special funds were not yet granted to meet Covid-19 expenditure. So, we are drawing general funds for this purpose," said municipal commissioners of Amudalavalasa, Palasa and Palakonda, M Ravi Sudhakar, T Nagendra Kumar and E Lilly Pushpa Nadham respectively in a chat with 'The Hans India'. Due to lockdown, property tax amount also not collected properly, they added.