Jammu, Jan 29: The J&K government is giving an additional grant of around Rs 125 crores to the Jammu Municipal Corporation (JMC) for salaries of employees of the Corporation besides meeting other expenses, reliable sources informed.
This additional grant, they informed, is given by the government to the JMC as Jammu’s civic body is not in a position to even pay salaries to the Corporation employees.
“Apart from not being able to pay salaries to its employees, the JMC is also struggling hard to meet other expenses also, especially carrying out important works of constructing or repairing drains, lanes, small bridges besides other important works which need immediate attention,” Deputy Mayor, JMC, Baldev Billowria informed Rising Kashmir.
Reliable sources said the revenue generation by the JMC has gone from bad to worse in the past some time. They said that JMC has not been able to improve its revenue generation.
“This forced the government to intervene and provide additional funds to the JMC so that it pays salaries to its employees and also carries out other important works concerning common masses from time to time,” they said.
“Till around two months back, the government had been providing JMC additional grants of Rs 125 crores per year for paying salaries to the employees of the Corporation besides meeting other expenses, especially important works which require immediate attention,” former Mayor JMC, Chander Mohan Gupta told Rising Kashmir.
However, sources informed that due to poor revenue generation by the JMC, the additional grant of RS 125 crore being given by the government to the Corporation has now been further enhanced so that the JMC pays salaries on time to its employees besides meeting other expenses and carrying out works concerning common masses.
It is also learnt that the JMC is generating a revenue of around Rs 32-35 crores monthly. “This is far-2 less to even pay salaries to the employees,” sources informed adding, “With this revenue generation, other important works are getting a backseat”.
The JMC mainly generates revenue from building permissions, commercial establishments within its limits, parking slots, banquet halls, door-to-door garbage collection, rent from shops and quarters, hotels and restaurants, etc.