Pursuant to the instructions received by the Directorate of Municipal Administration (DMA), the Margao Municipal Council has stepped up its efforts to solve its sopo contract issues.
This is not the first time the DMA Director Elvis Gomes has pulled up MMC for its failure to recover the dues from sopo collectorate and had conducted an inquiry in 2014.
Earlier this month, in a memorandum issued to the municipality, Elvis had urged the MMC to make all attempts to recover the dues from the sopo contractors. The DMA had criticised the Margao Municipality for not being serious in dealing with the contractors and had put the onus of responsibility on the chief officer to ensure that there is no loss of revenue.
“Vendor’s fees is one of the main sources of revenue for any municipal body and chief officers or commissioners must ensure the contractors to whom the work is outsourced, pay the fees to the council from time to time,” said Elvis.
He further observed there is a general tendency on part of contractors to collect huge sums from vendors during festivals when temporary stalls are set up in public places. But later fail to deposit the collected fee. Elvis sought to know why no action is taken against such erring contractors.
The memorandum had pointed out that if the sopo tax (market tax) had been outsourced to contractors, the civic body must ensure the contractor pays the municipality the amount due as per the contract.
“The chief officer or commissioner shall ensure that adequate bank guarantees are taken from contractors and the same are encashed without hesitation in case of any default on part of the contractors,” the memorandum stated.
Gomes had asked the chief officers to improve internal mechanisms to prevent loss of revenue through such lapses.
It may be recalled that the MMC has been under scrutiny for discrepancies as there was an agreement with the sopo contractors where the MMC were to pay the amount only after collecting the money from the vendors.
It is to be noted that the MMC has to recover the dues running into Rs 25 lakh from four former sopo contractors. MMC had released the cheque kept as security deposits without getting the revenue.
“The pending recoveries of Sopo have been advised by the DMA. We have started the action for recovery of dues from the 4 Sopo collectors. We have got the information of their movable and immovable assets. We will move to seize their properties and will soon get a warrant issued. These are contractors who have defaulted in the past. We have recently won the case against these defaulters and will soon issue notice,” said MMC chief officer Yeshwant Tawde.
It may be recalled that in the budget session held by the council in March, the Council has resolved to enhance the Sopo Tax tender amount to Rs 50 lakh from the previous Rs 35 to 40 lakh. Currently the Sopo is handled by a single contractor.
