Mumbai: The Brihanmumbai Municipal
Corporation having an annual budget of over Rs 26,000, has
been struggling to recover arrears to the tune of Rs
2,787 crore till March 2012 from various sources.
The arrears include rent from leaseholders of civic
property, penalties and excess payments from contractors
and premiums from developers.
According to officials from Municipal Chief Auditors
department, the BMC could have used this money to construct
number of tunnels to connect water pipelines in order to
resolve city's growing water woes apart from several
infrastructure projects undertaken by the civic body.
"The outstanding amount was revealed in an internal audit
test report submitted by the chief auditor's department to the
standing committee recently," they said.
Also, the civic-administration is planning to shut the
Municipal Chief Auditors department.
"Additional Municipal Commissioner (Projects), Rajeev
Jalota issued a circular on January 5, stating that they are
either planning to shut the department or it will be merged
with any other department," officials said.
"We have apprised the standing committee on the issue,
which in return has written a letter to Jalota, seeking
an explaination in this regard," they added.
The officials also alleged that since 1997, examination
for senior auditors have not been conducted.
PTI
First Published: Tuesday, August 28, 2012, 13:24