NIC official says civic body has failed to process requests
the goan I network
MARGAO
When the Margao Municipal Council (MMC) embarked on the e-governance project around three years ago, the objective was no different. In fact, online payments found favour with citizens, so much so the municipality used to receive on an average around 5-10 online requests for tax payments, including house tax, trade licence, rent, etc.
Three years down the line, however, MMC’s online payment has gone haywire, with the civic body no more processing the on-line payment transactions and the system shut down for the moment by the National Informatics Centre (NIC) for want of support and cooperation from the MMC.
In fact, inquiries by The Goan have now revealed that on-line payments have come to a full stop since July 1 last for reasons best known to the Municipal authorities. Online requests made by around 70-80 persons since the last two months have remained unprocessed till date, prompting NIC to shut down the facility after correspondence to Chairperson Babita Angle Prabhudesai, Chief Officer Y B Tawde and the MMC at large has
failed to evoke any positive response.
A senior NIC officer told The Goan that the system is down and out for the moment simply because the Municipal taxation section is not processing the requests for online payments.
“The civic body need not appoint an hand to man the online payments. The work of processing the requests for online payments should form part of the Municipal administration. All the Municipal taxation department should do is to direct any of its section employees to process the requests for on-line payments,” remarked
the official.
Replying to a question, the NIC official pointed out that around 70-80 requests for online payments are pending for the moment for want of processing by the MMC. He feared that citizens may finally stop availing the online payments if there’s further delay in reviving
the system.
“You will not believe that citizens putting up outside Margao, including Mumbai, who had invested in property, were availing the online facility,” he added.
When The Goan drew attention of MMC Chairperson Dr Babita Angle Prabhudesai, she promised to look into the matter.
“Only recently, I had discussions with a private bank to find whether they can handle the on-line payments other than the existing bank. The issue will be sorted out soon,” Babita said.
However, when pointed out that the system is down because there’s no hand in the civic body to process the on-line payment requests as claimed by the NIC official, the MMC chairperson has promised to find out the exact cause.
“This forms part of the administration function and officials ought to handle the matter at their level. Still, I will find out from the Chief Officer and other officials the reason if the system has collapsed,” Babita added.
