With budget cut, 200cr dreams of civic body shattered

Chandigarh: The revised estimates (RE) on the current financial year’s budget issued by the Union ministry of finance has come as a major blow for the municipal corporation (MC), Chandigarh. Out of Rs 202 crore additional budget, Chandigarh administration had demanded Rs 200 crore for MC on their request, the ministry has turned down entire additional amount.
The denial to give Rs 200 crore is major humiliation for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led MC. On September 26, 2021, the then Chandigarh mayor Ravikant Sharma had announced in the monthly general house meeting that MC is going to get Rs 200 crore more grant-in-aid (GIA) from Chandigarh administration, which would have taken the current annual financial budget of the MC from Rs 500 crore to Rs 700 crore.
With this decision of the central government to not give any single penny to the Chandigarh administration, it will keep getting its earmarked GIA on regular basis. Since the Chandigarh administration has been giving quarterly GIA, the MC has already get majority of the earmarked amount. “Since we failed to get additional amount from the central government, we will not be able to give additional money to the MC in this prevailing situation,” a senior official of the UT administration said.