Fund crunch hits development works in Vijayawada

Vijayawada: Thousands of people living at Nandamuri Nagar, Santi Nagar, Vaddera Colony, Andhra Prabha Colony, Indira Nayak Nagar and other areas are living without basic amenities like roads, side drains and underground drainage. 

Though the Vijayawada Municipal Corporation is collecting more than 15 types of taxes and charges from the denizens, builders and realtors, it failed to provide basic infrastructure in these areas.  

This can be attributed to the funds crunch being faced by the civic body, which is spending Rs 10 crore for payment of salaries every year. The state government, which is alleging that the Central government is not sanctioning grants to the state is doing the same with the local bodies. The corporation is collecting about Rs 100 crore in the form of taxes. But this is not sufficient for the development of the city.

Due to shortage of funds, the corporation is not able to develop infrastructure like laying of roads, construction of side drains, underground drainage, culverts and widening of roads.

Consequently, people living in the areas from 52nd division to 59th division are facing many hardships for nearly two decades. These areas are the backward areas in the city with less infrastructure. On the other hand, people are unhappy with the payment of taxes to the civic body when there are no basic facilities.  

The VMC is collecting BT Road cutting charges, water tap charges, paper publication charges, professional tax, property tax, city level infrastructure fee, debris charges, penalisation charges, development area charges (built up area), building material charges, additional building license fee, tree guard charges, vacant land tax (VLT) and others. These taxes and charges are amounted to crores of rupees every year.

Tax Payers Association secretary MV Anjaneyulu said the city could not be developed only with the taxes collected from the denizens. He said the state government during the last four years sanctioned only Rs 3,300 crore to 110 municipalities in the state. This is just over Rs 800 crore per year to 110 municipalities.

Cities like Vijayawada, Tirupati and Vizag need thousands of crore for the development works. Population is gradually increasing in the capital region of Vijayawada and Guntur after bifurcation.

In this backdrop, the state government must allocate more funds for the development of the cities, said M V Anjaneyulu. Due to shortage of funds, the VMC is not able to construct new roads in the areas like Andhra Prabha Colony and Nandamuri Nagar where construction activity is in full swing for the last few years.

Water is getting stagnated in dozens of colonies due to lack of sewage system. Side drains were not built over the years in many colonies. 
As a result, water stagnated in the colonies became breeding grounds of mosquitoes.

Chigurupati Babu Rao, former city CPM secretary, said most of the areas in these municipal divisions were built in low-lying areas and several hundred should be spent for the development of infrastructure.

Mayor Koneru Sridhar has been asking the state government to pay salaries to the staff under the 010 head, which was one of the pre poll promises of the TDP. Though many representations were submitted to the state government there is no progress on payment of salaries under the 010 head. 

Mayor says the VMC is facing a huge burden of paying salaries more than Rs 10 crore a year. If the state government pays the salary, the VMC can spend the amount for development of infrastructure.

Moreover, the municipal contractors are also not coming forward to take up the works for late payment of bills. This is also one of the reasons for the backwardness of many colonies in the city.