MARGAO
The Margao Municipality finally cleared the Diwali bonus on Tuesday, bringing cheers to the hundreds of municipal employees.
Chief Officer Agnelo Fernandes, who honoured his promise made to Opposition leader Digambar Kamat to clear the Diwali bonus when the employees had gone on strike last week, however, faces a challenge of sorts -- how to arrange a mountainous Rs 2 crore to pay the staff salaries and wages by November-end.
With just seven days to go for the payment of November salaries and hardly Rs 15 lakh in the municipal coffers as of Tuesday, the Chief Officer is indeed facing a challenge to mop up revenue so as to credit the staff salaries and wages on time.
Given the magnitude of the financial problem, the Margao Municipal Council and the administrative head are weighing various options: One, go all out to mop up revenue via tax recoveries from households and business establishments to Rs 2 crore. Secondly, recover the tax arrears as much as possible so that the municipality is in a position to at least pay the net salary like what was done by the civic body two months ago.
Thirdly, the MMC is anxiously waiting for the government to bail out the civic body by paying the second instalment of salaries of the common cadre staff and the DA of the employees, which taken together works out to around Rs 1.90 crore.
The civic body is also hoping the government would reimburse the money to the civic body paid as wages and salaries to the 50 labourers engaged for the disaster management work during the monsoons.
Inquiries by The Goan has revealed that the MMC had around Rs 30 lakh in its coffers on Monday when the bonus amounting to Rs 15 lakh was credited in the accounts of the staff and employees, leaving Rs 15 lakh as the balance amount.
“If the civic body has plans to clear the gross salaries of the staff and employees, it will have to arrange minimum Rs 1.75 crore, considering the payment of the daily wage workers as well,” remarked a civic official.
Chief Officer Agnelo Fernandes, however, sounded confident when he said that all-out efforts would be made to pay the staff salaries by month-end.
“We have decided to take certain measures that would help the civic body recover the arrears. I am confident that the MMC would be in a position to mop up the revenue”.
“If the government sanctions Rs 1.90 crore, the amount the government is required to pay to the civic body on common cadre salaries and employees DA, it will go a long way to credit the staff salaries without much of a problem,” he added.
