After a high drama and upheaval in the Special Budget meeting, the Vijayawada Municipal Corporation council on Saturday approved the draft budget of ₹1,327. 64 crore for the coming fiscal year.
All the council members, barring those from the YSR Congress Party, the main Opposition, consented to adopt the budget, with an opening balance of ₹45 crore and ₹88 crore deposits. The estimate was proposed by the standing committee headed by the chairman Koneru Sridhar.
Earlier, Mr. Sridhar suspended YSRCP floor leader B. Punyaseela, who allegedly used unparliamentary language against a woman member.
Ms. Punyaseela pointed out the mistakes and repetition of certain pages (9 & 121) in the budget book, printed colourfully and bundled in a hard cover for the first time.
Following her suspension, all YSRCP members boycotted the council and walked out. The budget was later approved by the council which also took a note of the mistakes printed.
Speaking on allegations of increasing taxes, Mr. Sridhar said that the corporation had set higher targets in the wake of increasing number of D&O trade licences and campaign for collection of pending property and vacant land taxes that were not touched for a long time.
Slum development
Mr. Sridhar further said that 40% of the income would be spent on the development of slums in the city.
Municipal Commissioner G. Veerapandian said that the estimated income was more than the previous year’s budget only because of an increase in the collection of property taxes and vacant land taxes, but there was no hike proposed for taxes.
Of the total budgeted amount of ₹1,327.64 crore, the revenue income stands at ₹562.21 crore and capital income is estimated to be ₹633.38 crore.
The Corporation’s revenue expenditure would be ₹429.40 crore and capital expenditure ₹716.45 crore. It would repay loans to the tune of ₹46.77 crore.
The corporation has allotted ₹291 crore for construction of bridges, flyovers and subways on M.G Road and Eluru Road in the city to facilitate Metro Rail construction. For development of burial grounds ₹1 crore has been allocated.
