The conciliatory talks convened by the Thiruvananthapuram city Corporation Mayor Arya Rajendran on Monday to resolve the ongoing protests by the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) regarding revenue collection issues remained inconclusive with the BJP claiming that the talks had failed and the Mayor saying that the steering committee had already taken much of the steps that the BJP has been demanding.
Speaking at a press conference on Monday evening, Ms.Rajendran said that the steering committee has decided to publish the ward-wise list of those who have not paid building taxes to allay the fears of the public.
The Secretary has been given the responsibility of sorting out the issues faced by those whose tax payments have not been recorded, if any such cases exist. She said that fake messages are being circulated asking the public to come directly to the Corporation office to check whether their tax payments have been recorded, after reports of fund misappropriation by some officials at the zonal offices.
"No money has been lost from the money collected from the public. The issue was with the remittance of the Corporation's money to the common bank account. We are exploring the possibilities of opening eleven separate accounts for the 11 zonal offices so that monitoring of the funds is more convenient. We have requested the government to sort out the issues regarding the Sankhya software," she said.
Explaining the detailed timeline of the issues, she said that a revenue officer who had newly taken charge at the Sreekaryam zonal office had noticed the anomalies in revenue collection on July 16 and promptly reported it to the Corporation Secretary. The Corporation administration on July 19 requested the local fund audit officials to carry out a detailed check of revenue collection at all the 11 zonal offices and the main office. The official at the Sreekaryam office, allegedly responsible for the anomaly, was suspended on the same day. The revenue collection records of the past two years are being checked, as the audits have been completed till March 2020, when the COVID-19 outbreak happened.
Based on the reports of the audit team, officials at the Nemom and Attipra zonal offices were suspended. The police have also registered FIRs in each of these cases, based on the Corporation's complaint. As of now, fund anomalies to the tune of ₹5.7 lakh have been unearthed at the Sreekaryam zone, ₹26 lakh at the Nemom zone and ₹1.7 lakh at the Attipra zone.
“I don't have the opinion that the talks with the BJP have failed. The steering committee has already taken the steps much before they raised similar demands. They demanded that the erring officials have to be arrested. That is not for the Corporation to decide. We have taken all the possible steps, including suspension of the officials, based on the investigation that we had demanded,” said Ms.Rajendran.
