G Plus Volume 1 Issue 45

2
Lead Story
G PLUS AUG 09 - AUG 15, 2014
CAG FLOORS GMC IN AUDIT
The Guwahati Municipal Corporation has come under fire following the audit report filed by
the Comptroller and Auditor General
Mrinmoyee Hazarika
For the last one month, the local
authorities have been seen
toppling down illegal dwellings
and sweeping up the drains and other
channels of the city in order to make
it free from encroachment.
All these exercises to mitigate the
flash flood situation of the city, which
took 11 lives occurred at the end of
June this year, could have been avoided
if the authorities had sincerely carried
out their duties and responsibilities
from the very beginning.
In its performance audit report on
the working of the GMC for the fiscal
year 2012-13, undertaken by the CAG
(Comptroller and Auditor General), it
had mentioned that building bye laws
were violated by NOC holders due to
lack of supervision by GMC.
“Rule 58 read with sub-rule
(58.17) of the building bye-laws states
that the structural design, constructional
standard etc of all multi-storeyed
building are required to be supervised
during construction at three
stages viz foundation, plinth/ground
floor and upper floor. Scrutiny of records
disclosed that the GMC had no
system to supervise the under construction
buildings as per rule. Taking
advantage of the loopholes in the
bye-laws and due to lack of supervision
on part of the corporations, developers
as well as individuals made
gross deviations by contravening the
approved building permission” the
CAG report says.
The report further mentions that
an illustrative but not exhaustive position
of penalties were imposed for
violation of various provisions of the
building bye-laws during the period
of 2007-12.
“A total number of 272 cases were
penalised due to violation of various
provisions of building bye-laws. Out
of 272 cases, in 93 cases, penalty was
imposed ranging from a minimum of
`1.02 lakh to a maximum of `26.32
lac. This indicated that the lack of supervision
had enabled the promoters
and individuals to violate the master
plan and zoning regulation of the
GMC,” the CAG report also states.
The office of the Comptroller and
Auditor General, which is responsible
for carrying out audits at different
levels of the government also stated in
its report that the GMC did not follow
the procedures prescribed in the
bye-laws in regard to processing and
approving building permissions.
“Audit observed that during the
calendar year 2010, as many as 392
NOCs were issued wherein GMC
cleared NOCs within 55 days in case
of apartments or commercial establishments,
while in residential houses,
it took a minimum of 518 to maximum
of 941 days. This indicated that
authority had no mechanism to clear
the cases in a first come first serve
basis. Moreover, reasons for delay in
issues of NOCs were not on record in
Suspected mis-appropriated
amount by GMC
Year Date of collection Amount (in Rs)
1/4/2010 28,700
14/12/2010 32,812
2010-11 01/01/2011 021,440
18/01/2011 36,547
Total 1,19,499
Detailed cases of penalty imposed
`1 lakh and above for violation of
building bye-laws
Year
Total no of
NOCs issued
Total penalty
cases
% of violation Total penalised
cases
“
A total number of
272 cases were penalised due to
violation of various provisions of
building bye-laws. Out of 272 cases,
in 93 cases, penalty was imposed
ranging from a minimum of `1.02
lakh to a maximum of `26.32 lac.
Total amount of
penalty
2007-08 399 18 4.51 12 43,86,524
2008-09 480 77 16.04 41 2,31,43,164
2009-10 496 67 13.51 22 1,14,57,359
2010-11 589 58 9.85 14 65,38,936
2011-12 471 52 11.04 4 27,13,563
Total 2,435 272 11.17 93 4,82,39,546
SOME RECOMMENDATIONS FOR GMC
• A structured system of planning - long, medium and short term and
systematic reporting mechanism needs to be implemented to enable
improvement in the deliverables of the Corporation and provide adequate
feedback to all stakeholders.
• Budget formulation should be realistic and completed within the time
frame as stipulated in the GMC Act, 1971. No expenditure should be
made before the approval of the Annual Budget.
• Effective monitoring, supervision by the higher authorities should be
ensured to stop pilferage of revenue.
• Effective action needs to be taken to ensure dwelling houses to urban
poor are completed as per schedule.
• Action needs to be taken to bring all of GMC’s landed properties to GMC
own possessions and made encroachment free.
the test-checked cases,” CAG report
says.
During its audit, CAG also found
anomalies in the handing of financial
matters of GMC, which includes
delay in making budget estimates,
huge variations in expenditure made
without budget provision, deficiencies
in maintenance of cash books, misappropriation
of municipal fund etc.
The report mentions, “Analysis
of the relevant files relating to budget
estimate of the corporation revealed
that GMC took the initiative for
preparation of annual budget with a
delay of five to fifteen months while
the adoption of budget estimates was
delayed by six to eleven months. Scrutiny
of records also disclosed that the
GMC authority spent a minimum of
`59.59 crore to a maximum of `104.34
crore before the final approval of the
budget during the period of 2007-
2012”
Besides, it was also observed during
the audit carried out by CAG that
the corporation spent `7.97 crore under
the major heads during 2007-08
and 2009-10 without budget provision
which indicated absence of budgetary
control over expenditure.
Moreover, the report also mentioned
that between June 2009 and
March 2012, an amount of `10.21 crore
was handed over by the six branches
of the corporation to the three banks
engaged by the corporation to collect
day-to-day receipts directly from the
different branches, for onward deposit
into the representative bank accounts
of GMC. The amounts so collected by
the banks were not accounted for the
municipal cash book.
mrinmoyee.hazarika@g-plus.in