GUNTUR: Cracking the whip, the Guntur Municipal Corporation (GMC) has decided to disconnect drinking water connections to tax defaulters of commercial establishments including hotels and apartments.
GMC has also decided to write to discoms to disconnect power supply in case the taxpayers did not come to terms.
Taking the poor collections from the water user charge particularly from the commercial establishments with a serious note, commissioner Puli Srinivasulu directed the engineering department officials to start disconnection of the water connections to the major defaulters. He appealed to all the water users to pay the charges immediately to avoid disconnection of the taps. He warned that they would levy heft penalties as re-connection charges if the dues were not paid on time.
“We will issue two-day notice to all water meter users for payment of dues. We will not wait if they did not respond to clear the dues,” said the commissioner.
He constituted special teams with ward administrative and revenue secretaries in each ward secretariat exclusively to crack the whip against the water meter users. Revenue officers should set their focus on collection of taxes from the big defaulters by initiating measures under Revenue Recovery (RR) Act.
He directed the deputy commissioners to monitor the tax defaulters’ issues to shore up the revenues of the civic body.
According to information, GMC fetched just around Rs.9.13 crore against 51.16 crore from the water user charges during the current fiscal. The total collections for water user charges stood at a dismal 17 percent of the target. Although water user charges collections were increased by nearly 10 percent over the previous year during the corresponding period, commissioner is not satisfied with the overall performance of tax collections. While GMC pooled up nearly Rs.8.29 crore from Apl-Dec, it could manage to collect around Rs.9.13 crore during the current fiscal.
“We are spending huge for supply of drinking water to the people in the city. However, the revenues from the water user charges are not up to the satisfaction,” said Srinivasulu.
