Mangaluru: Mangaluru City Corporation (MCC) Commissioner Hephsibha Rani Korlapati on Tuesday said a preliminary inquiry into the Mangalore One citizen centres shows that the company that was tasked with running the centres, was involved in the manipulation of tax receipts, without issuing proper bills.
Responding to a question on the status of investigation on the alleged fraud, Ms. Korlapati said, “We have completed the inquiry and there were manipulations. We will prepare a report of the inquiry in 30 days”, she said, during MCC general meeting held here on Tuesday.
Mangalore One, a private company was entrusted with the responsibility of collecting tax on behalf of the Mangaluru City Corporation. Lately, there were complaints from the tax payers that the private company was not issuing bills in receipt of tax payments.
The Superidentending Engineer of MCC said Mangalore One was not providing computerized generated receipts to the tax payers. It shows that the company could have been involved in corruption, he added.
MLC Ivan D’Souza said that it was a serious issue. “MCC should register a police complaint against Mangalore One and scrap any further negotiations with them, if manipulations were found. Why has the MCC continued to deal with them and allowed them to collect tax payments? he asked. The MLC suggested MCC to introduce tax payment directly through bank, which he felt is transparent.
Premanand Shetty, councillor said that manipulation of collected tax by Mangalore One pictures the city corporation in a negative light. “Mangalore One collects bills related to MESCOM, BSNL etc. And, these companies have a proper database to ensure transparency. Whereas, the revenue officers are not in touch with Mangalore One to ensure proper functioning and follow-up”, he said.
Another councillor suggested a Lokayukta inquiry into the case. Later, former mayor Mahabala Marla raised the issue of a few pending works, which were proposed during his tenure as the mayor. He wanted to know the status of E-toilet, software to document Malaria disease, digital meters for water connections, computerisation of MCC database and the pending Rs 41 crore of KUDCEMP grant. However, there were no proper answers.
A few councillors expressed unhappiness over the functioning of the Solid Waste Management system, which has been handed over to a private agency. The members informed the council that the waste collectors were not going to all houses and there were complaints. “If the contractors can not do their job as directed in the tender, the MCC should scrap the contact”, one of the councillors said.
