MARGAO: Aquem Baixo and Colva gram sabhas on Sunday approved their respective budgets with Aquem Baixo condoling the death of former chief minister Manohar Parrikar while Colva providing Rs 1 crore for construction of panchayat ghar.
At Aquem Baixo the gram sabha commenced by observing one minutes silence in respect of Manohar Parrikar after which the surplus budget was taken up for discussion and approved without much debate.
The total expenditure projected for 2019-20 is Rs. 1.15 crore as against the estimated income of Rs. 2.01 crore while the panchayat has an opening balance of Rs. 1.56 crore.
Aquem Baixo has provided Rs. 61.61 lakhs for public works while Rs. 25.20 lakhs have been provided for administration that includes salaries of the staff and honorarium to the panchayat members. Besides Rs 7 lakh is expected towards garbage funds as some installments of the last year were not released to the panchayat.
As against the total receipts of Rs 6.75 lakh by way of house tax, the projections for next year is Rs 8 lakh and Rs 2 lakh from construction license fees under which head last year Rs 1.16 lakh were received. And though the panchayat received only Rs 79,220 as trade tax it is expecting to collect Rs 1.5 lakh under this head.
At Colva, the total receipts expected are Rs. 1.20 crore as against the total expenditure of Rs 3,49,82,000. However, the panchayat has an opening balance of Rs. 4.48 crore.
The budget has allotted Rs. 50 lakhs for construction of drains, roads and culverts and Rs. 1 crore for land acquisition for panchayat ghar and Rs 10 lakh for dry waste segregation centre. Incidentally the panchayat ghar of Colva is muddled in some controversy as the land has been encroached upon by some villagers with the tacit support of the earlier panchayat body.
At Colva while only Rs. 9.38 lakhs was collected as house tax for the next year it is proposed to collect Rs 12 lakh as house tax and as against the Rs. 9.14 lakhs collected as trade tax, it is proposed to collect Rs 12 lakhs under this head in the new financial year.
