Commercial and residential incomes are evading payment of water bills. Therefore, the Water Supply Department of the Municipal Corporation has decided to levy a penalty interest of one percent per month on the non-paying income. This decision will be implemented from April 1.
The arrears of commercial and residential water bills in the city have reached Rs 650 crore. Measures have been taken by the water supply department to recover this amount. Till now no interest was charged on outstanding amount. Due to this, it was observed that the outstanding amount is also increasing. Therefore, the water supply department had proposed to levy a penalty of one percent on the outstanding amount if the water bill amount is not paid within the next 60 days from January 31st.
This proposal was also approved by Municipal Commissioner, Administrator Vikram Kumar. Accordingly, this term will end on March 31. After that, a penalty of one percent will be levied on the outstanding amount, said Nandkishore Jagtap, Chief Engineer of the Water Supply Department.
Municipal Corporation supplies water to railways, camp councils, archeology departments, central and state government offices, semi-government offices.
Municipalities send only water payments to these offices. As these offices provide various services to the citizens, no action can be taken against them. However, these offices often refuse to pay the water bill. Despite repeated notices to these offices, water dues are not paid by them. Therefore, they will also be fined. Also, this penalty will be levied only on arrears with commercial water meters. It has been claimed by the water supply department that this decision will also benefit in terms of income growth.
Arrangements have been made to send payments from the Municipal Corporation to the customers who are supplied with water through water meters. However, if some customers do not receive the payments, they should collect the payments up to January 31 from Lashkar, Swargate, SNDT-Chatu:Sringi Water Supply Department and pay the arrears before March 31, the Municipal Corporation has appealed.