The Bhopal Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) Rs 3,353 crore budget was presented by Mayor Malti Rai on Tuesday amid pandemonium by ruling BJP and Congress corporators. The budget speech began with uproar by Congress corporators over promises made in the last budget. Congress corporators said that there should be detail data of promises fulfilled and discontented in the last year budget. There were no hike in taxes and during this financial year aggregated income remain Rs 3352.16 crores and cumulative expenditure is also expected the same. Leader of Opposition Shabista Jaki said that there is nothing new in this budget and the last year’s budget has been revised with nominal changes. Mayor Malti Rai did not give details of last year’s budget and recent interim budget. She alleged that there is no discussion on Rs 700 crore, which is lapsed. She said, “Old budget has been presented in a new envelope. There is no new initiative.”

 

Under ward planning fund, Rs 21.25 crores have been provisioned (Rs 25 lakh per ward) and 50 per cent of property tax fund will be spent on development work of wards. In this budget, Corporation Chairman fund has been decided as Rs 2 crores which is same like last year. For Mayor, fund is decided as Rs 5 crores. MIC member Manoj Rathore said that there is no property tax being collected from old city and many wards are in poor condition. He said that corporators want to increase the facilities and spend more money but they are not collecting property tax. He further added, “If corporators help to collect property tax from old city areas, I would spend entire money on wards.” Reacting over his statement, BMC Chairman Surayavanshi said that BMC will be conducting drive to collect the tax. Congress Corporator Mohammed Sarvar raised the issue of corruption and alleged that tender is being released to the firm for personal benefits.

 

The budget presented on Tuesday includes provision of Rs 40 crore under Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana, Rs 10 crore for development work of illegal colonies, Rs 5 crores for water resources and development in slums, Rs 35 crores for construction of drainage, Rs 5 crores for fencing of Government land freed from encroachment. There is also a provision of Rs 5 crores for lake conservation, Rs 2.5 crores for development of immersion ghats, Rs 5 crore for mini sports center, 27.15 crore for education related equipment for facilitating the students, Rs 10 crores for convention hall. The budget provisioned Rs 10 crore for purchasing door-to-door garbage collection vehicle, Rs 10 crore for maintenance of traffic squares, Rs 5 crores for heritage gate at main roads.