Gandhinagar municipal commissioner CR Kharsan will present the first-ever draft budget of Gandhinagar Municipal Corporation (GMC) before the standing committee on February 2, Thursday. The commissioner is likely to present a draft budget of around Rs15 cr for 2012-13.
After formation of Gandhinagar Municipal Corporation in 2011, this will be the state capital city’s first budget. However, there is no possibility of budget allocation for development work in this budget because the GMC still has a very limited role to play in development of Gandhinagar and majority of the departments are taken care by state government’s urban development department (UDD).
Ten months after wresting power in the newly-formed civic body, the Congress, the ruling party in GMC, has only the sanitation and malaria departments under its control. Other departments are still looked after by the UDD.
The municipal commissioner’s budget will show around Rs11 crore as grant from the state government and Rs1 crore from professional tax. “As the source of income and powers transferred to the civic body are limited, naturally the budget size will also be very limited,” said a GMC official.
The GMC has estimated Rs14 crore from the proposed property tax. However, the proposal is still pending with the state government and so it has not been included in the budget proposal. “As and when the state government allows us to levy property tax on the citizens, the civic body can plan development works accordingly,” said official.
As GMC has not been covered under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission, it has to depend on various grants released by the state government’s UDD.
