Nearly three years after the trifurcation of the erstwhile Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) that has left the civic bodies in tatters, a proposal for the merger of the three corporations have been sent to the Union Urban Development Ministry. From massive financial crunch to deteriorating development index, civic bodies have realised that the solution to all their problems lie in the merger of all three corporations.
“Considering the present circumstances, three corporations have decided that the merger of all is the most feasible option. A proposal has been sent to the Urban Development Ministry and to the BJP high command. We are now awaiting their response,” said Mohan Prasad Bharadwaj, North Delhi Municipal Corporation Standing Committee Chairman.
At the time of trifurcation, the then Congress Government of Sheila Diskhit was informed that creation of east and north civic bodies would not be financially viable as most of the developed and planned areas from where largest chunk of taxes and income is collected would go to the SDMC.
The South Corporation requires less development owing to already developed areas leading to surplus funds. Whereas, most of the underdeveloped areas, resettlements colonies, urban and rural villages, slums and juggis starving of development with less income came under the jurisdiction of North and East Delhi corporation.
Considering the ground realties, the then Chief Minister promised enough grant to all three corporations to liquidate their financial liabilities to zero. However, the Congress could not come to power in all three newly created municipal corporations and the Delhi Government backed out of the assurance.
“All five big hospitals are under NMC. The medical staff, paramedical staff has to be paid. The cost of maintenance and salaries is much higher than what SDMC and EDMC has to pay. Therefore, there is no uniformity of resources and funds,” said Bhardwaj.
Moreover, with financially well-off SDMC there is a huge disparity in tax collection between NDMC and SDMC. With more public and private properties, SDMC fetches more property tax than its North counterpart.
With the trifurcation of the MCD, the salary expenditure rose by three times. The north civic body, which is facing severe cash crunch, has decided to work with a trimmed workforce and do away with contractual employees to shore up its finances. For NMC, monthly expenditure on salaries remains at Rs170 crore with the yearly expenditure aggregating to Rs2,100 crore. For EDMC, the monthly expenditure on salary is Rs87 crore.
EDMC was already reeling under debt when the MCD was divided into three. Presently, EDMC requires at least Rs 1,200 crore annually for paying salaries and disbursing old age pension. Due to the ongoing financial woes, the EDMC could not pay salaries to its staff and pension to the retired employees for few months and old age pension/widow pension of the last 22 months.