The fund-starving Kakinada Municipal Corporation (KMC) has flooded with inflows of cash to the tune of ₹51.5 lakh in three days. Thanks to the notification issued by the State Election Commission to conduct the municipal polls and made it mandatory for the aspirants to clear all their dues to the local body before filing the papers, the contesting candidates and their family members lined up in long queues at the corporation’s office to clear their dues, including house tax, water tax and vacant land tax.
It is interesting to note that of the 493 aspirants who have filed their nominations, most of them have cleared at least one due to the civic body and obtained no-dues certificate from the officials. The last minute rush at the counters for two days from August 9 has forced the KMC employees to work for extra hours. The cash counters at both the headquarters and the divisional-level offices of the civic body turned into the hubs of activity, whereas the coffers continued to ring in.
A few aspirants even cleared their dues during the scrutiny of their nomination papers that took place on Friday and submitted the no-due certificates to the election officers. In all, the KMC received ₹19.17 lakh towards the house tax dues, ₹6.44 lakh towards the pending water tax and another ₹6.24 lakh against the vacant land tax from the aspirants. This is in addition to the ₹18.65 lakh that was collected towards the nomination fee, which, however, is refundable in the event of withdrawal of the nominations.
“The Election Commission’s decision is highly commendable. The last minute rush at the cash counters is a classic example to showcase the inordinate delay in making the tax payments,” observes Dusarlapudi Ramana Raju, an independent candidate in the poll fray from the 35th division and convener of the People’s Voice organisation. He further highlights the need for the KMC collecting long pending dues from various government departments towards the taxes, as the dues, he says, are amounted to a few crores of rupees.
44 nominations rejected
Meanwhile, the election officials rejected 44 nominations during the scrutiny, as the candidates failed to fulfil the prerequisites specified by the Election Commission. After the scrutiny, 449 candidates are in the poll area prior to the commencement of the nomination withdrawals.
