MARGAO: The outstanding tax recovery drive initiated by Margao Municipal Council Chief Officer (CO) Agnelo Fernandes and the council witnessed a new peak on Wednesday, with a record collection of Rs 65.73 lakh. The mega drive was kicked off in early October.
While the goal is to achieve zero per cent outstanding in the near future, the CO added that presently the income of this council has risen to Rs 1.56 crore. The CO and MMC Chairperson Lyndon Pereira thanked the staff for their efforts and the public for their cooperation.
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The CO has appealed to all those who haven’t cleared their huge outstanding dues, to do so and complete their repayment process by October end.
Fernandes warned that post October 31, MMC would resort to more stringent methods like even sealing the premises of those who had not cleared their outstanding dues.
The CO also warned those who are operating business within the municipal boundaries without proper trade licences.
He said he will have a zero-tolerance approach and will lockdown such establishments as it is against the constitution of the MMC to do business without a trade licence.
It may be recalled that last month, given that the MMC was facing a fund crunch in view of unpaid house, business taxes and other fees, an appeal was made to the citizens and businessmen to repay the dues.
The CO had earlier feared that MMC would face hurdles to repay staff salaries for the month of September.
Thereafter, a special second Saturday weekend repayment drive was launched on October 9 while MMC teams made door-to-door rounds of big business establishments informing them about their outstanding dues and the MMC recovery process.
The CO added that MMC always held goodwill with the citizens and business community but due to the circumstances, the civic body had resorted to applying pressure on the tax defaulters as the chain of tax repayments and MMC services had to run for the betterment of the area under MMC’s jurisdiction.
Fernandes also requested the public to use the cash, cheque and or DD and online repayment methods, as per their convenience. The MMC online payment portal can be viewed on https://goaulbservice.gov.in
