Civic body to present budget in 1st week of Feb; new taxes unlikely

FOCUS ON ESSENTIAL SERVICES BMC to prioritise roads, supply of drinking water and reducing waterlogging

MUMBAI: The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) is not likely to introduce any new taxes or increase existing taxes for Mumbaiites in its annual budget for the year 2020-21. The budget will be presented before elected representatives from the civic standing committee in the first week of February. However, it will be a tight budget with essential spending, according to a senior civic officer.

At a time when BMC, the country’s richest civic body, is facing a cash crunch, its budget for 2020-21 will prioritise improving essential services for the city, such as roads and drinking water supply, as well as mitigating waterlogging. It will also focus on completing existing big ticket infrastructure projects, such as the coastal road, the Goregaon-mulund link road (GMLR), and the Gargai dam drinking water supply project, said a senior civic official.

“There is definitely a financial crunch for BMC, and the budget takes that into consideration. There are sufficient resources to complete big projects that have already started such as the coastal road or GMLR. But they will eat up BMC’S deposits. To ensure deposits are not depleted in a way that BMC cannot do any essential expenditure later on, it wants to reduce recurring revenue expenditure.”

Substantial funds will be allotted for at least two new infrastructure projects that have been on the cards in 2019. These include construction of underground silos to hold floodwater during heavy rain to prevent waterlogging, and constructing missing road links, such as between NCPA at Nariman Point to Cuffe Parade.

Due to the financial crunch, BMC will delegate its non-essential or discretionary responsibilities to be fulfilled under public private partnerships (PPP). Some non-essential or discretionary duties of the municipal corporation, which will be done through PPP, are the maintenance of gardens, forts, sports complexes, auditoriums, swimming pools and infrastructure for secondary school education. The official quoted above said, “BMC cannot compromise on expenditure for essential duties such as roads, water, sewage, garbage, primary education and primary healthcare. Other services will see reduced budgetary allocation and more participation from citizens.”

The health and education departments are likely to not see increases in budgetary allocation this year, unlike last year’s budget when BMC substantially increased funding on both.

The senior civic official said,

“BMC is spending adequately on education, but it is not able to extract full outcome of the expenditure. The budget will focus on improving learning outcome in schools and better governance in hospitals.”

More measures to eradicate tuberculosis and improve the health of new mothers and newborns in slums areas will be announced in the budget, said the official.