Hyderabad: To keep up with the rapid strides of Hyderabad towards becoming a global city and to develop basic amenities and living conditions accordingly, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) needs to focus on increasing its revenues by correcting internal loopholes and looking at ways to mop up additional resources, Telangana State Finance Commission Chairman G Rajesham Goud said.
Goud, who met with Mayor B Rammohan, DS Lokesh Kumar, GHMC Commissioner, and other officials here on Wednesday, told officials that if needed, the methodologies adopted for resource mobilisation by other municipal bodies in the country should be studied. By imposing a minimal tax on hotels, petrol and vehicle sales and other sales as Hyderabad City Development Fund, the civic body could generate considerable revenue, he suggested.
“Other municipal corporations are collecting taxes in the name of city sanitation, and we need to consider the same,” Goud said. Officials were also told to consider Octroi, Professional Tax, MV Tax, Entertainment Tax and Service Tax.
Inspections
Earlier in the day, Mayor B Rammohan along with MLA Sudheer Reddy, inspected civic issues in Lingojiguda and sought information on problems faced by residents in the colonies of Dharmapuri, Green Park and Sai Nagar. The residents of Green Park Colony brought the issue of overflowing drainage in their locality to the notice of the Mayor, who asked officials concerned to resolve it immediately.
With sewage flowing onto the roads at Dharmapuri Colony due to accumulation in the nala, the residents took the issue to Rammohan and he asked the officials to take action to solve the issue.
Special Drive
As part of its special drive, Recyclothon, to collect scrap and other disposable materials from households, the GHMC has collected 20.298 metric tonnes of materials on Wednesday.
During this drive, residents in different parts of the city handed over electronic waste, broken furniture, damaged mattress, plastic and other waste on a large scale, to the civic body staff. So far, the GHMC has collected a total of 94.634 MT of disposable trash and the drive will continue till November 12.
The waste collected on Wednesday includes 0.507 MT electronic waste, 11.759 MT of broken furniture, 3.399 MT damaged mattress and 1.083 MT of plastic waste, a press release said.